Tokyo Electric Power Company is set to scrap all four reactors at the Fukushima Daini nuclear plant in northeastern Japan. The reactors have been offline since the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
TEPCO is expected to reach a formal decision as early as this month. The plant is located about 12 kilometers south of the Fukushima Daiichi plant that was severely damaged in the 2011 disaster.
WASHINGTON — Toyota Motor Corp said Wednesday it will build a new sport utility vehicle at its $1.6 billion joint venture assembly plant in Alabama rather than produce Corolla cars. The largest Japanese automaker announced in January 2018 it would build the factory in Alabama in a joint venture with Mazda. Toyota said the shift is due to "a growing consumer appetite for light trucks and SUVs." Mazda announced in February 2019 that it would build a new SUV at the plant. Toyota said it still expects the plan to start production in 2021. Construction remains on schedule, and hiring has begun. The plant could create up to 4,000 new jobs and build 300,000 vehicles annually. Corolla production will remain at Toyota's plant in Blue Springs, Miss.
A Japanese high court is about to rule whether operations at two reactors at the Genkai nuclear power plant in Saga Prefecture, southwestern Japan should be suspended.
The Fukuoka High Court will hand down its ruling later on Wednesday.
A Japanese district court has ordered the operator of the Fukushima Daiichi power station to pay about 3,000 dollars in damages to a man who worked at the plant just after the 2011 nuclear accident.
The man says he was exposed to radiation without being informed about high radiation levels in a building where he worked.
In a statement released on Thursday, Nissan's Spanish arm has announced the cut of 600 jobs, or nearly 20 percent of the local workforce, at its facility located in Barcelona.
The operator of the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant says it will accept foreign workers hired under Japan's new visa program for work to decommission the facility.
Tokyo Electric Power Company, or TEPCO, says it reported the decision at a meeting in late March to dozens of companies carrying out the decommissioning. The firm had not permitted foreign trainees to take part in the work.
The operator of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant began removing nuclear fuel rods from a storage pool in one of the damaged reactor buildings on Monday.
This is the first time Tokyo Electric Power Company has removed fuel from any of the three buildings housing reactors that melted down after an earthquake and tsunami in northeastern Japan in 2011.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says the government will continue the task of decommissioning the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. The nuclear accident at the plant in 2011 was triggered by an earthquake and tsunami that hit northeastern Japan.
Abe visited Fukushima Prefecture on Sunday to inspect the decommissioning work and the ongoing reconstruction of the prefecture.
Last month, Honda announced that it would shut down its Swindon plant in the UK in 2021 when the current-generation Civic runs its course.
As previously reported, General Motors has announced a $300 million investment in its Orion Township assembly plant in Michigan.
General Motors will announce on Friday plans to invest $300 million in a suburban Detroit plant that builds electric and self-driving vehicles for Chevrolet and the automaker's self-driving Cruise unit, two people familiar with the plans said on Thursday. The largest U.S. automaker is expected to announce it plans to build a new electric compact vehicle for Chevy, said the people, who asked not to be identified. GM executives also will formally endorse a revised North American free trade deal known as USMCA, the sources said. GM declined to comment. Company executives are expected to make the case that the new EV — originally considered for one of GM's Chinese plants — is being built in the United States because of the new trade deal that is still awaiting approval by the U.S. Congress. GM has come under harsh attacks from President Donald Trump over its decision to end production at its Lordstown, Ohio, assembly plant. On Thursday, the company said its executives would be joined at the Orion plant by United Auto Workers union Vice President Terry Dittes and government officials to announce "a major new investment focused on the development of GM future technologies." GM Chief Executive Mary Barra is expected to make the formal announcement, which could add hundreds of jobs. The new Chevy vehicle is based on the same compact architecture as the Chevrolet Bolt EV and the Cruise AV that are assembled in Orion. The Orion Township plant is slated to begin building a new generation of electric and self-driving vehicles, using GM's dedicated BEV3 architecture, but not until 2023, a third source said. GM said a year ago it would invest $100 million to upgrade the Orion Township plant ahead of commercial production of the Cruise AV in late 2019. Rival Ford this week said it planned to expand its Flat Rock plant outside Detroit to add production of electric vehicles, an investment of more than $850 million expected to add 900 jobs. Ford's first self-driving vehicles will be assembled nearby at an as-yet-undisclosed location.
A junior high school in a village near the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant has held its first graduation ceremony since resuming classes after the lifting of an evacuation order there. The order was issued after the plant's nuclear accident resulting from the massive 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
Iitate Junior High School was forced to operate in Fukushima City after the March 11 accident, as the entire Iitate Village was subject to the evacuation order. The school reopened there last April after the order was lifted for most of the village. The disaster occurred on the day of the school's graduation ceremony that year.
As expected, due to the strong possibility of a no-deal Brexit, there’s more bad news for the United Kingdom and its automotive industry as Honda has confirmed plans to close its Swindon plant in 2021.
LONDON — Japanese carmaker Honda is set to announce the closure of its Swindon car plant with the loss of 3,500 jobs, Sky News reported on Monday. Sky News said that the announcement by Honda could come on Tuesday, and that the plant was scheduled to close in 2022. Spokesmen for Honda were not immediately available to comment on the report. "That's speculation so we wouldn't comment on that," a spokeswoman for Britain's business ministry said. Honda built just over 160,000 vehicles at its British factory last year, where it makes the Civic Hatchback and Type R, accounting for just over 10 percent of Britain's total output of 1.52 million cars. It ceased building the CR-V crossover there last year. The firm said last month that it will shut its British operations for six days in April to help it counter any border disruption from the Britain's departure from the European Union. It has also said it was preparing to front-load some production at its plant to ship overseas or build up inventories. Factors other than Brexit are said to have contributed to Honda's decision, Sky News reported, but any such announcement would come just over two weeks after Nissan canceled plans to build its X-Trail sport utility vehicle in Britain. The BBC also reported that Honda was due to announce the plant's closure. It quoted a tweet from a conservative member of Parliament, Justin Tomlinson, who said, "Honda are clear this is based on global trends and not Brexit, as all European market production will consolidate in Japan in 2021."
Japanese carmakers Nissan, Toyota and Honda build roughly half of Britain's cars and, along with the rest of the sector, have been proponents of free and unfettered trade after Brexit, calling on politicians to provide clarity as soon as possible. U.S. carmaker Ford told British Prime Minister Theresa May last week that it may have to move some production out of Britain because of Brexit, according to a source on the call. Honda has struggled in Europe and built increasing proportions of its cars for sale outside of the continent in recent years. For example, the Civic Type R's engine is built in Ohio and shipped to Swindon.