Niigata Thermal Power Station
Niigata Thermal Power Station, also known as Niigata Karyoku Hatsudensho, is an LNG-fired power plant in Niigata city on the Sea of Japan coast. It is owned and operated by Tohoku Electric Power.
The plant began with Unit 1 in 1963, Japan’s first to use a mix of natural gas and heavy oil. Four units were built between 1963 and 1969. Units 2 and 1 were retired in 1983 and 1984 due to obsolescence. Plans to extend Unit 3 were canceled in 2006, and the plant was closed in 2009. Unit 5, a high‑efficiency combined‑cycle unit, started in July 2011. After the 2011 earthquake, Unit 6 was added as emergency generation and began operation in January 2012, but it was taken offline in March 2015 as cheaper energy sources and repairs became available. Unit 4 was decommissioned in September 2018.
The plant used to receive natural gas via a 251-km pipeline from the Aga-oki offshore field, but it now uses imported LNG. The current operation consists of a single unit with a total nameplate capacity of 1,090 MW.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 16:36 (CET).