JERA to decommission 3 oil-fired power plants in October

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's biggest power generator JERA said on Monday it will decommission three oil-fired power stations with a combined capacity of 2.6 gigawatt (GW) at Hirono in eastern Japan on Oct. 10.

The move comes as the company is replacing old thermal power plants with new ones with less emissions of carbon dioxide(CO2).

JERA, a joint venture between Tokyo Electric Power and Chubu Electric Power, will permanently close the 43-year-old 0.6-GW No.1 unit, the 34-year-old 1-GW No.3 unit and the 30-year-old 1-GW No.4 unit, all of which have been shutdown since 2016-2018.

JERA is currently replacing 2.99 GW thermal power plants with new facilities.

After the decommission, JERA's capacity of thermal power plants would total 55.77 GW, excluding those under construction, a company spokesperson said.

(Reporting by Yuka Obayashi; editing by Miral Fahmy)