Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) opened a month-long public comment period on September 18 for a draft that would raise the statutory ceiling on nuclear regulatory inspection fees, the charges levied on reactor operators and other nuclear licensees to fund the regulator's on-site inspection work. The draft cabinet order would lift the cap set out in Article 65, paragraph 2 of the enforcement order for the Act on the Regulation of Nuclear Source Material, Nuclear Fuel Material and Reactors from ¥9.41mn to ¥40.72mn, more than quadrupling the existing ceiling.
| Item | Current cap | Proposed cap |
|---|---|---|
| Statutory ceiling for nuclear regulatory inspection fee | ¥9.41mn | ¥40.72mn |
The NRA attributes the jump to two changes in how it calculates the fee. It will start counting labor costs that were never included when the inspection regime was introduced, estimated against the current fiscal year's budget for both the energy special account and the general account. It is also updating the per-unit costs for materials, such as running the inspection IT system and general administration, and for staff travel, to current fiscal-year prices. The regulator says the trigger is recent inflation in prices and wages, which it said was straining its own budget when the commission ordered a review of the fee formula at a meeting on December 3, 2025.
The commission approved the draft and the plan to seek public comment at its 32nd meeting on September 17. Comments can be filed through the e-Gov portal or by post through October 17, a 30-day window under the Administrative Procedure Act. If adopted, the amended cabinet order and a companion rule issued by the Nuclear Regulation Authority itself, which sets separate fee schedules for different facility types, from power reactors to waste-storage and reprocessing sites, would take effect on April 1, 2027.
The draft remains open for comment and the notice does not attach the change to any specific operator's costs.