????盡管核能項目的危險性顯而易見，位于環太平洋火山帶之上的日本在很久以前就開始了在這個領域的發展。

????由于強烈地震引發福島核泄漏事故，日本關閉了國內48座核電站，只有2座仍處于運轉狀態。現在，迫于能源需求壓力，日本政府領導人表示，他們準備再次踏上發展核能之路。理由？因為日本的技術官僚們相信，日本掌握著世界上最先進的抗震工程技術。

????福島核事故發生前，多數日本人都有這樣的想法。但事故發生后，技術方面的把握和進入科技黃金時代的承諾都被恐懼所取代。28歲的管道工根本忍以勞務分包形式在福島第一核電站工作。他說：“我覺得這要怪那些設計人員和工程師。他們知道有風險。現在的情況和原來一樣。”

????根本忍的工作是維護福島核電站的冷卻管道，它們數量龐大而且極為重要。2011年，日本東北部發生地震后，福島第一核電站就安裝了這些管道，以便讓反應堆一直處于冷卻狀態。雖然故障頻頻，但工作人員必須不斷向反應堆堆芯泵水。盡管目前堆芯溫度較低，已經沒有危險，但如果停止冷卻的時間超過40個小時，堆芯就會暴露在外，它的溫度就會再次上升，重新變得不穩定。

????海嘯、地震、電力中斷，所有這些都可能讓情況再次變得令人恐懼。根本忍說：“電力公司沒有對我們以誠相待，還讓我們置于危險之中。”他指的是福島核電站所代表的極為傲慢的態度。

????日本政府承諾將對核電行業進行改革，希望借此緩解選民的緊張情緒。新設立的原子能管制委員會（NRA）堅持實施的新指導方針已于7月8日生效，該方針依法要求核電站經營方為“嚴重事故”做好準備，以降低地震等重大災害所帶來的危險。

????日本官方數據顯示，福島事故發生前，日本核電站的抗震情況良好，甚至在震級高達7.2級的神戶地震發生時也能安全停機。不過，神戶大學（Kobe University）地震學教授石橋克彥認為，現有技術還無法防止核電站在最嚴重的地震災害中發生事故。去年，石橋克彥在一個新聞發布會上說：“如果把設備加固到能承受那樣的沖擊力，設備本身就會無法投入運行。”

????但私營核電企業并沒有因此而停止嘗試。這些企業的工程師們一直在忙于對核電站進行升級，以達到NRA的要求——NRA把這些要求稱為世界上最嚴格的抗震和抗海嘯標準，日本核電行業為此已經付出了數十億美元的代價。

????Teetering along the Pacific Ring of Fire, Japan has long cultivated a nuclear power program despite the obvious dangers.

????Now squeezed by energy needs, Japanese leaders say they are ready to embark again on the nuclear route after closing all but two of Japan's 50 nuclear reactors following the massive quake that sparked the Fukushima meltdowns. The reasoning? Japan's technocracy still believes it has the best quake-proofing engineering in the world.

????The majority of the population, until Fukushima, felt the same. Since then, technological certainty and the promise of a golden age of science have been shattered by fear. "I blame the planners and engineers; they knew the risks. It's the same now as then," says Shinobu Nemoto a 28-year-old plumber, subcontracted to work at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant.

????Nemoto helps maintain the myriad of essential cooling pipes that have been cobbled together since the Tohoku quake of 2011 to keep the reactors cool. Breakdowns are?frequent, but workers must keep the water pumping over the nuclear cores. Any break of more than 40 hours could see the cores, now thought cooled sufficiently to cease being a menace, heat up and become volatile again.

????Tsunami, earthquakes, power outages all threaten to bring the situation back to panic stations. "The power companies are not honest with us and put us in danger," he says of the colossal hubris that Fukushima has come to represent.

????The government is attempting to assuage jittery voters with promises of a reformed nuclear industry. Japan's new nuclear power watchdog insists fresh guidelines, which go into effect July 8, will legally require operators of nuclear power plants to be prepared for "severe accidents" mitigating dangers from earthquakes and other terrors.

????Until Fukushima, Japan's reactors had responded well to quakes and shut down safely even after events as large as the 7.2 Kobe earthquake, official records show. However, seismologist professor Ishibashi Katsuhiko of Kobe University believes there hasn't been a technology yet invented that can prevent a disaster in the event of the biggest earthquakes. "To reinforce facilities to withstand such stresses would make them unfeasible," he said at a press conference last year.

????That hasn't stopped the private-sector nuclear power industry from trying. Engineers have been busy upgrading atomic plants to meet what Japan's new Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) is calling the world's toughest earthquake and tsunami standards at a cost to the industry of many billions of dollars.