Japan
Japan instituted rolling blackouts starting on 14 March 2011 due to power shortages caused by the 2011 TÅhoku earthquake and tsunami. The Tokyo Electric Power Company, which normally provides approximately 40,000 MW of electricity, announced that it could only provide about 30,000 MW, a shortfall of 25 percent. This is because about 40 percent of the electricity used in the greater Tokyo area is supplied by nuclear power plants in the Niigata and Fukushima prefectures. Two of those plants, the Fukushima Dai-ichi and Fukushima Dai-ni, were automatically taken offline when the first earthquake occurred and have sustained major damage related to the earthquake and subsequent tsunami. Rolling blackouts of three hours were expected to last until the end of April 2011 and will affect the Tokyo, Kanagawa, Shizuoka, Yamanashi, Chiba, Ibaraki, Saitama, Tochigi, and Gunma prefectures.
Read more about this topic: Rolling Blackout
Famous quotes containing the word japan:
“I do not know that the United States can save civilization but at least by our example we can make people think and give them the opportunity of saving themselves. The trouble is that the people of Germany, Italy and Japan are not given the privilege of thinking.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)