Key Technology Policies to
Reduce CO2 Emissions in Japan

Foreword
Like similar analyses that WWF has produced for the United States and the European Union, this report indicates how Japan could make substantial early reductions in its emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) - the leading pollutant contributing to climate change, or global warming.

Faced by increasing physical evidence of global warming affecting human well-being and natural ecosystems in every region of the world and in most nations, WWF is convinced that industrialised nations must take important first steps against this problem by reducing their CO2 emissions by 2005.

As well as improving the changes of survival for those ecosystems and species which are most sensitive to rapid rates of warming, the period to 2005 is also relevant to today's political and economic decision-makers. Politicians must not shy away from acting on the clear scientific consensus that climate change poses an enormous threat to society and that reducing emissions quickly is the only responsible course of action. By enacting decisive measures now and in the next few years to start sending emissions on a downward path, they will leave their political successors more scope for managing future change. Delay will only increase the inevitable damage from global warming and force the next generation of decision-makers into implementing rushed, potentially costly and unpopular measures.

Businesses, too, will want to avoid expensive mistakes. Because targets for reducing CO2 emissions by 2005 affect today's investment decisions, there is an imperative for business to avoid spending on out-dated and polluting technologies. Looked at more positively, businesses that will profit will be those which are well-placed to deliver the clean and highly-efficient energy technologies that will be in increasing demand as the inevitable trend towards reducing CO2 emissions gathers momentum.

WWF is convinced that leading governments and corporations can afford to be far more ambitious in their targets for reducing CO2.

In WWF's report looking at the United States, analysts from the Tellus Institute in Boston, Massachusetts, showed how a series of policies and measures appropriate to different sectors of the US economy could cut CO2 emissions 10% below 1990 levels by 2005 and 22% by 2010. Moreover, the overall economic savings would amount to US$ 46 billion by 2005 and US$ 136 by 2010.

Investigating what a variety of proven policies and measures might produce in the European Union, experts from the Netherlands showed in detail how the EU could reduce its CO2 emissions 14% below 1990 levels by 2005, with reductions continuing beyond this date at 2% per year.

Because these analyses are based on real experience with measures that work, they have provided WWF with valuable opportunities to discuss practical steps for cutting CO2 with political and business decision-makers. We hope to have similar success with the present report which investigates some of the options available to Japan.