Chubu Electric Power Co. will build an 18-meter-high sea wall to shield its Hamaoka nuclear power plant in Shizuoka Prefecture from tsunami.
Chubu Electric Power Co. will build an 18-meter-high sea wall to shield its Hamaoka nuclear power plant in Shizuoka Prefecture from tsunami.
The utility said July 22 that the structure will be 3 meters higher than the tsunami that struck Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant and knocked out its emergency generators March 11.
In May, Prime Minister Naoto Kan asked the company to shut down all the reactors at the Hamaoka plant, citing its vulnerability to earthquakes and tsunami.
The utility suspended operations of the plant the same month.
The company said construction of the 1.6 kilometer long sea wall, to be built between the plant and shoreline, will get under way as early as next month and be completed in December 2012.
It is expected to cost about 100 billion yen ($1.27 billion).
Chubu Electric projects that tsunami that would strike the plant would reach about 10 meters high if a magnitude-9.0 temblor, the same size as the Great East Japan Earthquake, hits the area in the vicinity of the plant.