nuclear-news

Tepco trying to get investment partners forf its nuclear business

Japan’s Tepco to seek partners for nuclear business, Reuters, By Osamu Tsukimori and Aaron Sheldrick | TOKYO, 11 May 17 Japan’s Tokyo Electric Power Co said on Thursday it will seek partners for its nuclear business as part of a recovery plan after the Fukushima disaster of six years ago brought the utility to its knees and put it under state control.

The company, known as Tepco, is trying to place itself on a sounder financial footing after the government in December almost doubled its estimate for the costs related to the Fukushima disaster to 21.5 trillion yen ($188 billion).

It is the third attempt to boost its finances in the six years since the disaster, after the targets in previous plans proved to be unattainable.

Central to its efforts to boost profits and pay for the costs of the disaster is the restart of its Kashiwazaki-Kariwa (KK) nuclear plant in northern Japan, the world’s biggest power station not including hydroelectric dams…….

However, the governor of Japan’s Niigata prefecture, where KK is located, is opposed to a restart without a review of its safety plans, which could take several years. It also must resubmit applications with the national atomic regulator…….

Finding partners for Tepco’s nuclear business will be difficult. Top executives of Tohoku Electric Power and Chubu Electric Power, which operate in regions abutting Tepco’s service area, have said they were not considering any nuclear tie-ups with Tepco……

Tepco submitted the revised business plan to the government, which is expected to give its approval after providing its own input over the last few months.

Tepco plans to allocate 500 billion yen annually in the coming decades to pay for decommissioning at Fukushima and compensation.

Tepco is estimating net profit of 288 billion yen in the year through March 2018, more than double the year earlier period. Revenue is forecast to rise to 5.75 trillion yen from 5.36 trillion yen.

(Editing by Joseph Radford and Christian Schmollinger) http://www.reuters.com/article/us-japan-tepco-idUSKBN18718S

May 12, 2017 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | business and costs, Japan