Noshiro power station is a 1,800 MW coal power station in Akita, Japan. It is operated by Tohoku Electric Power Co. Based on its capacity (estimated), it can supply roughly 2.3 million homes (estimated). It ranks #48 of 692 Japan power plants by installed capacity. Commissioned in 1994, it is around 32 years old — long-established. Its modelled annual emissions are 10,006,400 t CO₂/yr (Climate TRACE), equivalent to about 2.3 million cars driven for a year. In context, coal supplies about 32.1% of Japan's electricity; the national grid averages 477 gCO₂/kWh (32.7% low-carbon) (2025).
Plant data: WRI Global Power Plant Database (CC BY 4.0), id WRI1000620.
Known, modelled and calculated values are kept separate. Missing fields are shown as unavailable.
The public capacity above is the current source-record value. A 2026 tracker candidate lists 1,800 MW for Noshiro power station, but it is not used as the public primary value until scope is verified (unit vs operating vs installed/project total).
Capacity claim grade: A3_MAJOR_REVIEW_SCOPE_STATUS - recommended action: manual_scope_status_check - confidence: low_until_scope_verified. This follows a claim-based data model: value + scope + source + confidence, rather than silently overwriting records.
The capacity and/or fuel fields on this page include a source-backed provenance label from GEM, an official registry, Wikidata, OSM, or a cross-source match.
capacity: GEM tracker 2026 (location L100000102910); fuel: WRI source-record fuel
At 1,800 MW, Noshiro power station is well above the median coal plant in Japan (250 MW). Technically it is described as ultra-supercritical. Coal plants burn pulverised coal to raise high-pressure steam for a turbine; they run as baseload but are the most carbon-intensive mainstream source and the first targeted for retirement or efficiency retrofits.
Capacity comparison computed from the WRI Global Power Plant Database; fuel-type context is general engineering background.
This facility's annual emissions are roughly equivalent to:
Equivalencies via US EPA Greenhouse Gas Equivalencies; modelled emissions from Climate TRACE.
Installed capacity (MW), WRI Global Power Plant Database (CC BY 4.0).
Operated by Tohoku Electric Power Co. All plants by this company →
This coal plant burns coal to raise high-pressure steam that spins a turbine-generator. It sits in a humid subtropical climate (Köppen Cfa) — Northern Hemisphere, latitude 40.2°N — which shapes how much energy it can produce and how its output varies through the year.
Monthly mean temperature
Heating degree-days here run 17% above the median power plant in this dataset — a proxy for how much extra energy heated equipment must replace through its surfaces in winter.
Climate heat-demand index: 59/100 — this site sits in the mid third of the power plants we cover by heating degree-days.
Climate normals: WorldClim 2.1 (1970–2000 monthly normals, 10 arc-min, CC BY 4.0); zone: Köppen-Geiger world climate classification (Kottek et al. 2006, 0.5° grid). Degree-days & heat-demand index computed by PowerAtlas — a modelled heat-demand proxy, not a measured site figure.
For a plant’s outdoor hardware — heat-recovery steam generators (HRSG), expansion joints, valves, flanges and their insulation — the local climate sets how fast unprotected steel and coatings degrade. This site sits in a corrosive environment (estimated ISO 9223 class C4 — High), with humidity / wetness the leading environmental stress.
Higher environmental severity is exactly where protective removable insulation pays back most: a sheltered micro-climate slows corrosion, UV and thermal-cycling damage and extends outdoor hardware service life. This is an indicative site-climate context — not a condition assessment of any specific plant or operator.
Indicative estimate via the ISO 9223:2012 informative method (atmospheric corrosivity from temperature, time-of-wetness and airborne salinity), using WorldClim climate normals, the Köppen-Geiger class and coast distance. Indicative, not a measured corrosion rate.
The #9 largest coal power plant of 94 in Japan by capacity.
Japan has 94 coal power plants in this dataset, together about 53,431 MW of capacity.
Coordinates 40.1912, 139.9911 from WRI Global Power Plant Database (CC BY 4.0). View on OpenStreetMap.
Noshiro power station is a 1,800 MW source-record coal power plant in Akita, Japan, commissioned in 1994.
Its output is enough to supply roughly 2,252,571 homes (estimated).
Noshiro power station is operated by Tohoku Electric Power Co.
Noshiro power station has modelled emissions of about 10,006,400 tonnes of CO₂ per year (Climate TRACE).
