The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) has received one trillion yen (about $13 billion) in government funds, putting the operator of the tsunami-wrecked Fukushima nuclear power plant in Japan under effective state control.
TEPCO, one of the leading power utilities in Asia, has asked for taxpayer money to bolster its finances under a rehabilitation program created with a state-backed bailout fund in May.
The injection on Tuesday came in the form of Tokyo Electric's issuance of preferred stocks to the government giving it up to 75 percent of the utility's voting rights, Japanese media reported.
The capital injection is supposed to help the firm pay the massive cost of compensating victims of the nuclear accident and scrapping the plant's crippled reactors. People in 30 kilometer radius of the plant have been evacuated following radiation after its reactors were knocked out in the quake-triggered tsunami of March, 2011.
But Tokyo Electric continues to face rough going. The company was recently forced to lower household rate hikes and fuel costs are rising for thermal plants now making up for the loss of nuclear power, the reports said.
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