The 1995 earthquake depressed Japanese GDP for one quarter, but by the second quarter the prodigious reconstruction effort had precipitated a commercial boom that ultimately lasted for well over one year. But the Kobe disaster did not compromise the national energy grid in the same way that the Tohoku events have now done. Not only are the six damaged reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant disabled, so too are seven other TEPCO nuclear plants and four of the plants operated by Tohoku Electric Power Company. Some of those facilities are probably safe and could be reopened if it were not for the profound anxieties that Japan now feels about nuclear power in general. Indeed, at least one prefectural governor has announced that he will not approve the reopening of reactors in his region for months or even years. Nor can the two companies easily replace the energy thus lost by expanding operations at their non-nuclear-generating facilities, as a number of their oil, gas and geothermal plants have also suffered considerable harm. Other countries would simply reallocate electricity from other parts of the national grid, but Japan cannot do this because different regions function on different hertz cycles. The upshot is that almost all of the excess capacity in the system that serves the Tokyo metropolis has been eliminated, and a surge in demand during the hot summer months could cause unpredictable blackouts there and in other economically critical areas. Officials have now announced rationing plans, including limits on how much energy manufacturers can employ, but there is no guarantee that such measures will suffice to keep the economy functioning without impedance. The likelihood of widespread power shortages is therefore a real risk looming on the horizon.