Yesterday I visited the TEPCO Power Museum, ignorant of the fact that its been permanently shut down. I asked a building employee why, but got no answers. I figured it must have been do to TEPCOs bad PR since the nuclear incident, and I was right.
The museum's closure is related to both TEPCO's bad reputation and the fact that it is severely in debt. The company's slogan, "Lets make friends with electricity," is apparently no longer true.
Thanks for posting! I was thinking about this, and I think that while it is too bad that the museum is closed down permanently, it may be something that is necessary for TEPCO to do, aside from bad PR and financial issue. Since the company faces massive accountability for the nuclear disaster and a energy future that relies heavily on their ongoing response, I might see it as "disrespectful" if TEPCO decided to keep their museum open, and be very critical of the image that they put forth from the museum. With an estimated 20,000 deaths as a result of the nuclear reactor and tsunami, it would seem eerily strange if TEPCO had a museum in Tokyo that they continued to administer that may not emphasize the degree of the disaster.. Maybe in the future, they would re-open the museum to educate the effects of the nuclear disaster, etc, but I think that since not even 1 year has passed, it wouldn't be appropriate to have a museum like this open where they spend money on "good" PR...
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