The Japanese Electricity System 15 months After March 11th 2011

The Great East Japan earthquake and tsunami on March 11th 2011 caused mass destruction, significant loss-of-life and a large displacement of people. It also placed significant strain of Japan's electricity-generating infrastructure. There was a significant reduction in capacity due to the damage in thermal generation and gradual closure of Japan's nuclear power plants; the ability for load-balancing across the Japanese grid was compromised due to limited interconnections between the different utilities that comprise the Japanese electricity system. This paper looks at the first fifteen months following the earthquake and tsunami: outlining the supply reduction and consequent attempts to manage the demand. In turn it highlights the foibles of Japan's vertically-integrated monopolistic structures and the evolution of governmental and utilities response that went from decisions made 'on-the-fly' to a more developed policy for peak-demand electricity savings. The findings from this paper should serve as a useful set of examples to aid decision makers in contingency planning for disruptive large-scale reduction in electricity-generating capacity

Avitha Sooful: Allegorical embodiments of the local landscape

This article offers a critical reading of a number of artworks by Avitha Sooful, mainly dating from the period 1980 to 2004. Readings of other relevant works that illustrate either continuities or disjunctures with her artistic practices and world views are included. This is part of a larger study that investigated the constructs of identity, place and displacement in the artworks of female artists who were employed at Vaal University of Technology (VUT) during that time.1 The first ten years of democracy and transformation in South Africa tacitly underpin the scope of the article, which focuses on Sooful’s cultural exchange and interchange with the changing political and social realities in a new South Africa. The theoretical underpinnings of this article are embedded in the discourses of geographically and historically specific events in South Africa, and cultural studies theories. They are framed by postcolonial readings of identity, place and displacement. The artist’s work is used to demonstrate how her subject position inspired her to produce artworks that reconfigured the local Durban and Free State regions over the 20 years concerned.http://journals.sabinet.co.za/ej/ejour_dearte.htmlhttp://www.unisa.ac.za/default.asp?Cmd=ViewContent&ContentID=20117am201