Tokyo Electric Power Co. and nine other utilities emitted a record amount of carbon dioxide in the business year that ended March 31 as the Fukushima No. 1 disaster caused a surge in crude and fuel oil consumption.
The regional power companies produced about 439 million tons of carbon dioxide for the year, up 17 percent from 374 million tons in the year that ended in March 2011, according to Bloomberg calculations based on data provided by the companies. Kansai Electric Power Co., the utility that relied most on nuclear power, discharged 65.7 million tons, a 40 percent increase in emissions of the greenhouse gas.
Japan was forced to find an alternative to nuclear power, which produces virtually no greenhouse gas emissions linked to climate change, after last year's earthquake and tsunami caused the worst radioactive contamination since Chernobyl in the 1980s. With all but two of the country's 50 commercial nuclear reactors offline and no date set to restart them, Japan is using record amounts of liquefied natural gas and sharply higher levels of fuel oil and crude to generate power.