Another Generator at Quake-Hit Hokkaido Power Plant Reactivated

September 25, 2018

Sapporo- The No. 4 generator of the Tomato-Atsuma thermal power plant in Hokkaido was reactivated Tuesday, its operator said, helping ensure stable electricity supply in the northern Japan prefecture hit by a strong earthquake early this month.

The 700,000-kilowatt No. 4 unit, the largest among the three generators at the Tomato-Atsuma plant, the largest thermal power station in Hokkaido, was brought back into operation at 3 a.m. (6 p.m. Monday GMT), Hokkaido Electric Power Co. said.

The plant shut down after the 6.7-magnitude earthquake rocked the prefecture on Sept. 6, causing a serious power shortage across the island. The plant is located in the town of Atsuma, one of the areas hit hardest by the quake.

The 350,000-kilowatt No. 2 generator of Hokkaido's Shiriuchi thermal power plant, located in the town of Shiriuchi, was also brought back online at around 1:40 a.m. after inspections were completed.

The recovery of the Tomato-Atsuma plant's No. 4 unit and the Shiriuchi plant's No. 2 unit raised Hokkaido Electric's total power supply capacity to 4.61 million kilowatts, 20.4 pct above the peak electricity demand of 3.83 million kilowatts assumed before the earthquake, company officials said.

In addition, in times of emergencies, Hokkaido Electric can receive electricity supply of up to 500,000 kilowatts from power companies in the Honshu main island, the officials said.

With peak midwinter electricity demand reaching as high as 5 million kilowatts in the island prefecture, Hokkaido Electric plans to ask residents and businesses in the region to make reasonable efforts to reduce power consumption as in previous years.

Previously, Hokkaido Electric said the Tomato-Atsuma plant's No. 4 unit would not be able to resume operations at least until November. But the unit was able to restart earlier since internal damage to its turbine equipment, which caught fire after the quake, was smaller than expected and the test operation went smoothly.

Of the Tomato-Atsuma plant's three generators, the 350,000-kilowatt No. 1 unit resumed operations Wednesday.

The restart of the remaining generator, the 600,000-kilowatt No. 2 unit, has been pushed back to mid-October due to equipment problems.

The No. 3 unit was decommissioned in 2005.

Before the earthquake, the Tomato-Atsuma plant supplied about half of the electricity consumed in Hokkaido, one of Japan's four main islands. Jiji Press