Japan emissions cuts to rely on domestic efforts

Environment Minister Sakihito Ozawa said that Japan will try to achieve its new goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 25% from 1990 levels by 2020 mostly through domestic efforts, Kyodo News reported. Ozawa said Tokyo will basically promote nuclear power generation as a way of helping implement the fresh reduction target unveiled by Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama. Meanwhile, Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Masayuki Naoshima said that the country’s public commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 25% from 1990 levels by 2020 will be pursued when the target is taken as a global commitment. The new target is far more ambitious than an 8% reduction advocated by the previous government, but it is what Japan will suggest for the post-Kyoto Protocol framework to be defined by United Nations negotiations in Copenhagen in December. The Democratic Party of Japan has pledged to seek an environment tax within four years and start a mandatory cap-and-trade emissions trading system in Fiscal Year 2011 to address global warming.(September 20/24, 2009)