Japan to Fire Back Up Its Nuclear Plants

Japan isn't going to let one catastrophic meltdown scare it off of nuclear power forever. The country will restart its idled reactors later this year after implementing new safety guidelines, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told parliament today. Abe didn't say when the first reactor would come online, but he did say that the new standards could be adopted as early as July, the New York Times reports.

All 50 of the nation's nuclear plants were shut down after the Fukushima Dai-ichi disaster, though two were later restarted to provide emergency power to Osaka and Kyoto. Not one of the 16 commercial plants that were left undamaged by the quake would meet all of the new proposed safety guidelines, which include higher walls, backup power sources, and earthquake-proof command centers. (More Fukushima Daiichi stories.)