The Abe administration is studying a plan to require that power companies make "cooperation" payments to firms that cut their electricity use when demand peaks, sources said Wednesday.

It hopes to have the new system ready to go by fiscal 2016, when the sale of electricity will be fully liberalized, they said.

The country's electricity supply has become tight, mainly in high-demand summer and winter, as a result of the suspension of all reactors in the wake of the 2011 nuclear disaster at Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s Fukushima No. 1 facility.