Chubu Electric has told the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry that it may have reported work results that differed from reality, and billed for them, on part of the decommissioning of Hamaoka nuclear units 1 and 2. The ministry has responded with a second reporting order. Minister Ryosei Akazawa laid out the sequence at his post-cabinet press conference on 29 September.
What Chubu Electric reported
On Friday 25 September, Chubu Electric answered a reporting order issued under the law on reprocessing contributions. Akazawa said the company reported that, for part of the Hamaoka 1 and 2 decommissioning work it carried out in the 2024 fiscal year, it may have submitted work results that did not match actual work, and cost claims to match, to the Spent Fuel Reprocessing and Decommissioning Promotion Organization.
The wording is conditional: the source says the company may have done this. Akazawa said fact-finding and the search for causes are still under way, so the disclosure stops short of a finding of fraud.
Why METI ordered a second report
Akazawa said the number of cases was somewhat larger than the ministry had been told, and that some new facts had emerged. METI therefore issued a fresh reporting order to Chubu Electric on the same day, 25 September. The transcript gives neither the number of cases nor the amounts billed, and it does not set a deadline for the second response.
The next step is the answer to that second order. Akazawa said the ministry will weigh it and consider the necessary response in the "most strict" manner possible. He did not say what action that could involve.
Context
The case follows the seismic-data misconduct that led Chubu Electric to withdraw its Hamaoka restart bid, which Tokyo Brief covered in an earlier report on the withdrawal. The decommissioning-records issue is a separate matter concerning work billed to the promotion organization. The minister's briefing does not link the two.