“On January 24, Japan Industrial and Medical Gases Association (JIMGA) presented an urgent demand in writing to Toshimitsu Motegi, minister of International Trade and Industry, concerning the hike of power rates in joint names of nine industrial groups consisting of large electricity consumers like the Japan Iron and Steel Federation.

The reasons for the petition are summarized as quoted below.

“Following the substantial power rate hike by Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO) in last April, Kansai Electric Power and Kyushu Electric Power also applied for a significant rate hike in last November. A similar trend is forecasted to spread among the other power companies over the country. All of us engaging in the electricity-intensive industries have so far tried hard to make our best possible cuts of power consumption at the peak of demand and power-saving measures in the midst of the extremely severe power supply conditions under the close-to-zero operation of nuclear power plants in our country. The recent wave of rate hikes is far beyond our self-reliant efforts and the astronomically high rate-hike is hitting the business managements which have already been placed under the extremely hard circumstances so called “six-fold sufferings.” Should the situation of rate hikes keep going on, it would be very difficult for the electricity-intensive industries to maintain their business activities in Japan.”

For the above-mentioned reasons, JIMGA made the following two demands.

ⅰ) Considering that the operation of nuclear power plants is the most realistic measure to break through the current critical situation of energy supply, JIMGA anxiously demands the Government to establish a new standard for safety soonest possible and implement examinations on the standard, and then carry out, with the government’s responsibility, explanations to the involved local governments and go ahead with required procedures to re-start nuclear power plants as quickly as possible.

ⅱ) JIMGA eagerly requests the Government to make arrangements for a tentative strategy to maintain the current situation of the domestic manufacturers with any possible measures in financing, taxation or subsidies in order to mitigate influences by the power rate hike for a limited period until a normal situation is recovered after realization of restarting of the nuclear plants.

Furthermore, in the attachment to the submitted documents mentioning the concrete influences of power rate hike upon each industry, JIMGA referred to the power consumption of the industrial and medical gas industry which is so big as about 9 billion kWh and the consumption per sales amount (stated in the application for exemption in the Renewable Energy Buyback System) is extremely high of about 30 times of the average of all industries.

According to JIMGA, the cost increase for the year has resulted to amount to 5.2 billion yen. Should the same rate hike prevail all over the country, the increase could turn out to be 14.7 billion yen. Taking into account that these figures do not include the cost rise due to the fuel adjustment after revision of power rate four years ago, they will be equivalent to 9 billion yen and 25 billion yen respectively. It means that nearly 40% of the operating profit earned by the industry during the fiscal year ending March 2012 (estimated by JIMGA) will be blown off, leading to a serious life-or-death problem.

JIMGA also appeals that each of their member companies are now tackling various attempts with self-help efforts like shifting to night-time operations or improvements of their specific power consumption (25% saved compared with 1990), but that depending on the subsequent trend of situation, they would have no other way but take all possible countermeasures such as restructuring, personnel cost reduction, cutoff or integration of their production facilities (due to decreased demand for gases caused by declined consumption by customers or transfers to abroad).”