Chubu Electric Power Co. said Tuesday it has lowered its pretax profit projection for fiscal 2006 by 100 billion yen due to losses stemming from an accident last month at its Hamaoka nuclear power plant in Shizuoka Prefecture.

The new estimate is about 95 billion yen.

The country's third-largest electric utility also slashed its group net profit projection for the current fiscal year to 57 billion yen, down 63 billion yen.

However, it revised upward its sales projection by 0.7 percent to about 2.14 trillion yen due to an increase in its electric power sales.

The utility announced in late June that about 50 turbine blades at the nuclear reactor were cracked or broken. It was forced to close the reactor and shifted power generation to thermal electric power systems.