(Japan nuclear) Kansai power crunch just political rivalry?

[longship]

1. The way I understand it

Japan has two incompatible power systems. I don't know the specifics, but it was widely reported by NHK (Japanese network) in the weeks following the earthquake/tsunami. I have MHz Worldview on one of my local PBS stations and they run a lot of NHK, and we're running even more during the crisis. The reportage was pretty damned good. They were calling out the government and Tepco throughout.

They talked about the fact that northern prefectures had different power, or something. That was part of the problem with the severe power shortages immediately after the disaster. Unfortunately, there were no details and I did not follow up on it.

You might want to fact check it.