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Japan ups greenhouse gases reduction goal to 46%

by Reuters
Thursday, 22 April 2021 11:42 GMT

FILE PHOTO: Passersby wearing protective masks during the COVID-19 pandemic walk on the street at Shinjuku district in Tokyo, Japan April 6, 2021. Picture taken April 6, 2021. REUTERS/Androniki Christodoulou/File Photo

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Leaders lift emissions cut target from 26% to 46% ahead of a virtual climate summit called by U.S. President Joe Biden

By Yoshifumi Takemoto and Kiyoshi Takenaka

TOKYO, April 22 (Reuters) - Japan on Thursday raised its target for cutting carbon emissions to 46% by 2030, responding to pressure from the United States and domestic companies, along with environmentalists who criticized its previous goal of 26% as unambitious.

Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga announced the new target, compared with 2013 emissions levels, hours before the start of a virtual summit on climate change called by U.S. President Joe Biden. Other countries have also announced stronger action in the lead-up to the summit, with Britain pledging a 78% reduction by 2035.

Washington is seeking to restore its credibility on combating global warming after Biden's predecessor Donald Trump undermined an international consensus on reducing emissions and strongly backed fossil fuels.

Japan had been under pressure from the Biden administration to set a target for a 50% reduction, according to sources familiar with discussions held before and during a visit by Suga to Washington last weekend.

Suga said that achieving the new 2030 target would not be easy but that he would instruct ministers to accelerate plans on climate change responses, adding: "We will continue trying for an even higher cut of 50 percent."

Late last year, Suga set a goal for carbon neutrality by 2050, bringing Japan more into line with some other countries at the time.

UN climate scientists say the world's net CO2 emissions must fall to zero by 2050, to limit the rise in global temperatures to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius compared with pre-industrial levels. Exceeding that amount of warming would unleash the most severe impacts of climate change.

"Japan's increase to 46% is a welcome move, as is its informal pledge to aim for a 50% reduction," said Dylan Tanner, executive director of InfluenceMap, a London-based data analysis company told Reuters.

Japan's powerful business lobby, Keidanren, is dominated by energy-intensive sectors that represent less than 10% of the economy, resulting in national policies that favour coal and hindering attempts to combat climate change, an InfluenceMap study last year said.

The government is reviewing energy policy this year and has indicated it will aim for lower use of carbon-emitting fossil fuels in the electricity mix.

However, it has so far - to heavy criticism - kept up support for coal due to the slow restart of reactors after the Fukushima nuclear disaster in 2011 led to their shutdown.

"All eyes will now be on the pending revision of the Strategic Energy Plan, with huge parts of corporate Japan urging for a target of 50% or more renewables by 2030," Tanner said.

"Such a number would kick-start both regulatory reform and investment in Japan's power sector in line with global trends towards solar and wind."

(Reporting by Elaine Lies and Aaron Sheldrick; editing by John Stonestreet)

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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