J-Power shuts down plans for new coal-fired power plant

The power company is considered the biggest coal-fired power company in Japan.

J-Power has decided to scrap its plans to build a 1.2 gigawatt (GW) coal-fired power plant in Yamaguchi, western Japan after a comprehensive assessment of the changing business environment.

“We have decided to cancel our plan after considering demand outlook in western Japan, rising capacity of renewable energy and other circumstances surrounding our business environment,” Hitoshi Kanno, executive managing officer at J-Power said.

The move comes after Chugoku Electric Power and JFE Steel cancelled a plan to build a thermal power station last month, amidst growing global trends in decarbonisation.

J-Power said that instead, it plans to build a gasification facility at the No.2 coal-fired power plant in its Matsushima station in Nagasaki, southern Japan, to improve efficiency and curb carbon emissions.

“We aim to further reduce CO₂ emissions by co-firing biomass and ammonia in the future and use carbon capture utilisation and storage technology in the future. It would be the first step toward our goal of releasing CO₂-free hydrogen power generation and CO₂-free hydrogen production and supply,” Kanno said.

The company also plans to use technology it developed in its Osaki CoolGen’s project in Hiroshima, which generates electricity with both gas turbines and steam turbines through a coal gasification combined cycle, turning coal into a combustible gas with a high proportion of hydrogen.

With the gasification system added to the existing 500 megawatt power plant, the 40-year-old plant is estimated to improve its efficiency by 5 percentage points to 46% and reduce CO₂ emissions by 11% from the current level.