Twisting in the wind

TOKYO (TR) – From the Okinawan islands in the country’s subtropical south to Hokkaido in the wind-buffeted north, more than 1,300 tower-mounted wind turbines dot Japan’s landscape. Yet for the world’s second-biggest economy, the combined effect of these rotating blades is a drop in the bucket. The Japanese government hopes that by 2011 the contribution of wind power to the nation’s total supply will be 0.2 percent, a meager amount when compared to the 3 percent, on average, provided by wind within the European Union in 2005.

From a physical standpoint, the problems with expanding wind power include Japan’s mountainous terrain and the large number of seasonal typhoons. But more significant, experts say, is government policy. “Japan is in the Dark Ages when it comes to renewable energy,” says Mika Ohbayashi, director of the Institute of Sustainable Energy Policies, a non-governmental organization that has supported the installation of 10 community-funded turbines, the first of which was erected in Hokkaido seven years ago.

Japan has put the environment firmly at the top of the agenda at next month’s Group of Eight (G8) summit in Hokkaido. Up for discussion is renewable energy, which is part of the government’s plan to reduce greenhouse emissions over the next four years by 6 percent from 1990 levels, as dictated by 1997’s Kyoto Protocol. Japan has multiple plans and technologies in place to meet this goal, but it is now clear that instead of lightening its carbon footprint, the nation is, in part, making a careful sidestep.

The target under law for the supply of renewable energy, which can also include solar and hydroelectric power, has been set at 1.35 percent by 2011. “That number is so low,” Ohbayashi says, adding that with such an easy target utilities will meet their renewable goal and then subsequently buy less expensive forms of generation, such as the burning of trash, which will squeeze out wind power.

Hiroshi Imamura, director and chief researcher at the consulting firm Wind Energy Institute of Tokyo, believes that utility companies don’t favor wind power because the technology isn’t a large enough or a consistent enough source of electricity. This makes selling difficult. “A power company which has a small grid capacity might not be able to add power from wind,” Imamura says, “because it will not have the ability to then transfer it to another utility.”

Further hampering the industry was a revision last year to Japan’s building code that requires turbines to adhere to more strict construction standards in lessening susceptibility to earthquakes. Thirty-nine projects were subsequently suspended and six cancelled. Of the turbines already in place, two sit on reclaimed land in Tokyo Bay, and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries’ turbine at the edge of the harbor in Yokohama is Japan’s largest, producing 2.4 megawatts—enough to power 1,000 homes for a year.

In the future, Japan might solve its space problem by building offshore, as has been accomplished in Europe. But after accounting for ocean depths, wave action and maintenance issues, costs will be substantially higher. Though subsidies from the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization help offset costs, the construction of a standard turbine averages between ¥200 million and ¥300 million, a figure that Imamura believes could double for offshore projects.

Analysts see this as a crucial time. “Japan is facing a profound challenge in meeting its Kyoto targets, with its climate change policy now in flux,” says Mark Partington, a consultant to EEA Fund Management/Trading Emissions. He expects greater clarity to emerge next month in Hokkaido, where themes will include the framework for what will succeed the Kyoto Protocol.

To meet the 2012 emission goal, Japan has begun initial discussions for purchasing emission credits from countries that are emitting less than their target, a practice that is allowed under the Kyoto Protocol.

A domestic cap and trade scheme, in which companies assigned with emission caps are able to trade credits with one another, could be implemented in the future to encourage polluters to pollute less. Some see such a system as being critical. “The system is fair, transparent and allows the industries to decide how they wish to reduce their emissions,” explains Masako Konishi of the World Wildlife Fund. “They can choose to either reduce through their own effort or purchase credits.”

To this point, such a plan has been met with resistance by trade organizations. But that could be changing. “Opposition from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) and the Japan Business Federation to the introduction to cap and trade is weakening,” Partington says. “And given that all the US presidential candidates advocate cap and trade, and with this policy already being pursued in the EU, Japan, if it continues with its current policies, risks being isolated.”

The overall green message from Japan has been mixed to date. The ongoing dress-down campaign for summer, “Cool Biz,” which was started by former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in 2005, intends to raise consciousness about environmental issues by encouraging a reduction in air-conditioner use, but the string of recycled paper scandals earlier this year, in which paper makers like Nippon Paper and Oji Paper were found to have been significantly overstating for years the amount of recycled material in some of their products, certainly raises questions about the nation’s sincerity.

For its part, Tokyo has announced a strategy that will aim for 20 percent of the municipality’s power consumption to be sourced from renewable energy by 2020. The Odaiba wind turbines and the solar project in Asaka are, along with a rooftop garden and 92 square meters of solar panels atop the city government building in Shinjuku, among the projects that the metropolis hopes to expand upon with this plan.

Ohbayashi believes that the Japanese government needs to take the initiative. Though METI announced in March that technologies like solar power, biofuels and fuel cells would help Japan cut greenhouse gases, she believes a concrete plan is necessary. “We do not have an emissions target for 2020, 2030 and 2050,” she says. “The Japanese government has proposed that greenhouse gases be halved by 2050 worldwide, but they do not say anything about their own target.”

To Ohbayashi, time is fleeting. “This is not about the future,” she says. “We are facing it now.”

Note: This article originally appeared as a part of the feature for the June issue of iNTOUCH, the magazine of the Tokyo American Club.

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