Japanese power utility Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) is considering building a new 1,000 MW offshore wind project off Choshi (Chiba Prefecture) in Japan, consisting of 200 wind turbines rated 5 MW each. The company could invest approximately JPY1,000bn (US$9.2bn) in the project. Construction could start as early as fiscal 2019 (April 2019-March 2020). The company hopes to sell the produced power through the existing feed-in tariff (FIT) system.
TEPCO expects to increase its renewable energy production and hit the 7 GW wind power capacity target in Japan so that it can make up for the future costs of decommissioning its nuclear reactors or removing remaining radioactive substances following the accident at its Fukushima Daiichi power plant.
Choshi is a promising site for the development of a potential offshore industry in Japan. The location of the project is not far from Japan’s first offshore wind power generation facility, which was built in 2013.