Japan’s Tepco Plans $18 Billion Green Power Push by 2030

Tepco Renewable Power, plans to help fund its new ventures through a green bond offering that may exceed 10 billion yen and is likely to come before March, according to President Seiichi Fubasami. Offshore wind and hydro generation are the unit’s primary focuses as it seeks to develop 7 gigawatts of green power capacity in Japan and overseas in partnership with other companies.

Despite being home to numerous engineering firms that export power generation infrastructure, Japan doesn’t yet have a commercial offshore wind farm and will need to lean on other countries’ expertise to build out capacity.

Feed-in tariffs for Japan offshore wind projects will be set at auctions that have yet to be scheduled. Still, Fubasami said he expects the domestic farms to be the “most profitable” among the unit’s clean power ventures. The company aims to develop as much as 3-gigawatts of domestic offshore wind capacity in the next decade.

Developing that type of clean electricity is seen as key to meeting a government target of obtaining nearly a quarter of the nation’s power from renewables by 2030, up from 17% in the year that ended in March, 2019. Natural gas generated 38% with coal at 32% and nuclear at 6.2%.

Tepco Renewable Power aims to boost profits to 100 billion yen ($913 million) in 2030, from 40 billion yen in the year that ended in March, Fubasami said. Domestic offshore wind projects will contribute to about 20% of that future profit, with overseas offshore ventures adding 10%. Hydroelectric projects in and outside Japan will contribute about 15% each, with the remaining 40% coming from existing generation.