In an unusual move, a nuclear power exhibition facility in a small town in Yamaguchi Prefecture, which has been seeing a steady decline in the number of visitors in recent years, will reopen as a medical clinic when a new doctor starts work there in April.

Chugoku Electric Power Co., which runs the facility in the town of Kaminoseki, closed its Miraikan exhibition down on Feb. 3 for renovation. The utility denies it did so because the firm's efforts to promote nuclear power have hit a snag, stressing that it is merely playing its part in helping assuage a shortage of doctors in the town.

But the move nonetheless comes after the facility — a ¥100 million project originally constructed in 1999 to coincide with the planned debut of the Kaminoseki nuclear power station — saw a plunge in visitors following the 2011 nuclear meltdowns in Fukushima Prefecture.