Monthly Report

Taketoyo Thermal Power Plant to restart in January 2025, suspend biomass co-firing until FY2026 end

November 26, 2024
Taketoyo Thermal Power Station
JERA’s Taketoyo Thermal Power Station will briefly return to being 100% coal-fired. (Image: JERA)

JERA plans to restart the 1.07GW Taketoyo Thermal Power Plant Unit 5 in January 2025, a year after it was shutdown following a fire that broke out at the plant on January 31, 2024. Biomass co-firing will initially be suspended with plans to resume, albeit at a limited scale, around the end of FY2026.

Investigations determined that the fire was caused by high concentration of biomass fuel dust among other factors. Installation of a pneumatic transportation system was identified as one of the measures to prevent recurrence. “We plan to change the biomass co-firing ratio from the initially planned 17% to 8% for the time being. After that, we will consider further increasing it, provided that safety is ensured,” said JERA when outlining the power plant’s restart plans.

During the periods of 100% coal-fired operation and 8% biomass co-firing, JERA will aim to limit the unit’s use, as well as the use of its other coal power plants, to not exceed emission levels corresponding to those under a 17% biomass co-firing ration.

Taketoyo Thermal Power Plant was commissioned in 1966 with a single 220MW unit. Three 375MW units were then commissioned in 1972. While Unit 1 was decommissioned in 2002, Units 2 through 4 were decommissioned in 2016. Unit 5, which was commissioned in 2022, is the power plant’s only operable unit. Until the fire earlier this year, the unit co-fired coal with 17% of woody biomass.

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