Key Hokkaido Power Plant Unlikely to Fully Recover before Nov.

September 11, 2018

Tokyo- The mainstay thermal power plant in Hokkaido, which was severely damaged by a powerful earthquake last week, cannot return to full operation at least until November, far later than initially expected, industry minister Hiroshige Seko clarified Tuesday.

The tight power supply-demand situation that was caused by Thursday's 6.7-magnitude quake is projected to continue for a long time and affect daily lives and corporate activities in the northernmost Japan prefecture, where temperatures will go down quickly from now on to boost electricity demand for heating.

Hokkaido Electric Power Co. reported to Seko Monday night its assessment for when it can resume operations at its Tomato-Atsuma thermal power plant, which currently has three generators with the combined output capacity of 1.65 million kilowatts.

The plant is the largest thermal power station in Hokkaido, one of Japan's four major islands. Before the disaster, it supplied some 40 pct of the region's electricity demand, which peaks at some 3.83 million kilowatts.

The company told Seko that the 350,000-kilowatt No. 1 unit is expected to resume producing electricity in late September at the earliest, the 600,000-kilowatt No. 2 unit as early as mid-October and the 700,000-kilowatt No. 4 unit in November or later.

Previously, Hokkaido Electric said it would take a week or longer to restore full operations at the plant.

The regional power supplier now plans to restart the two 200,000-kilowatt generators at its idled pumped storage power plant in the town of Kyogoku on Thursday and Friday, respectively, to cover supply shortages.

At a press conference in Tokyo on Tuesday, Seko said the restart of the Kyogoku plant will reduce the possibility of conducting rolling blackouts. But at the same time, he stressed that Hokkaido Electric has to continue balancing electricity supply and demand on a tightrope, calling for efforts by local households and companies to cut their power consumption by 20 pct.

At a press conference in the prefectural capital of Sapporo, Hokkaido Electric Executive Vice President Ichiro Sakai said that a total of 13 boiler tubes suffered damage at the No. 1 and No. 2 units of the Tomato-Atsuma plant.

He also said it would take time to fix up the turbine system for the plant's No. 4 generator. Jiji Press