Since nuclear accidents occurred at Three Mile Island in the United States and Chernobyl in the former Soviet Union, plans for building new nuclear power plants decreased due to safety concerns in many countries throughout the world. However, since global warming has become a critical issue in recent years, nuclear power has once again received attention because it has lower CO2 emissions than thermal power. Therefore, the number of nuclear power plants has begun to increase.
Japan has few energy resources and the building of new nuclear power plants continued while other countries had stopped. As a result, Japan has the most advanced nuclear power plant related technologies in the world.
Our company has the highest share of orders and the highest production of expansion joints used for important piping of domestic power plants. However, in order to supply products to the world market where demand is increasing, it is necessary to acquire international standard certification. Currently, there are no uniformed international standards in this field. However, the ASME-NPT* Stamp has been used as a kind of international standard. We established a Project Team in December of 2007 in order to acquire this stamp.
*ASME is the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, which is a private organization that promotes standards in the field of mechanical engineering. “Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code (BPVC)” and “Nuclear Power Plant Components (NPT)” are stamps issued by the ASME that have become authorized in many countries outside of the United States.