TEPCO gets approval to restart two reactors at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa

Units 6 & 7 were given the go signal.

Japan’s Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO) has secured a safety approval from the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) to restart two of the seven reactors at the 8.2 GW Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant Niigata Prefecture, Japan.

According to Enerdata, the two units, namely Kashiwazaki-Kariwa 6 & 7, are Advanced Boiling Water Reactor units with an installed capacity of 1,356 MWe each.

However, the reactors will remain offline until several conditions are fulfilled: the mayor of Kashiwazaki called for at least one of the plant's reactors to be decommissioned before the restart of Kashiwazaki-Kariwa 6 & 7 while the Niigata Prefecture authorities do not want to discuss their restart before the Fukushima Daiichi accident review is completed.

"TEPCO filed for safety assessments of the two blocks back in September 2013 and estimates that restarting both two units would increase its earnings by around Yen100bn (US$890m) per year," Enerdata said.

This story was originally published by Enerdata.