Mibugawa Power and its wholly-owned subsidiary, Marubeni, have begun construction of a 175 kW small hydropower project in Fukushima Prefecture’s Minami Aisu County.

The small hydro plant is the first to be constructed Minami Aizu County since Japan’s 2011 earthquake and is part of a Reconstruction Design Council plan to make Fukushima a “frontier land of renewable energy.”

The plant will site on private and public land, with water being drawn from the Osawa River. Power generated by the project will be sold for more than 20 years under Japan’s feed-in tariff scheme, Mibugawa Power said.

The Shimogo Town project is Marubeni‘s eighth small hydropower plant since the company started operating them in 2006. The company said it plans to develop around 30 small and medium-sized hydroelectric facilities by 2020.