Japan opposition eyes bolder CO2 cuts

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's main opposition party will adopt bolder greenhouse gas cuts than the government by using the global emissions market and increasing green jobs if it wins an upcoming election, the party's head of green policy said on Wednesday.

Prime Minister Taro Aso plans to call an election for August 30, and the Democratic Party has their best ever chance of ousting Aso's Liberal Democratic Party, ending half a century of nearly unbroken rule by the business-friendly LDP.

Japan, the world's fifth-biggest greenhouse gas emitter, has failed to take leadership in talks on a broader climate pact due to be agreed in December in Copenhagen to replace the Kyoto Protocol after 2012.

The country's 2020 target to cut emissions by 15 percent below 2005 levels Aso announced in June provoked widespread criticism for being too weak and barely tougher than Japan's current Kyoto target, which it has struggled to meet.

Developing countries, in particular, want rich nations to pledge much deeper reductions of 25-40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020.

Tetsuro Fukuyama, also the Democrats' deputy policy chief, said the party's 2020 target to cut emissions by 25 percent below 1990 levels would impose regulations to curb emissions and incentives for energy conservation, increased use of renewable energy and development of green technology.

The goal would also be met by other measures, including buying carbon credits from clean-energy projects in developing countries, Fukuyama said in an interview with Reuters.

The policy steps to boost green industry include a carbon tax, carbon trading with compulsory emission caps, as well as a plan to boost the ratio in primary energy supply of renewable energy sources such as solar and wind power to 10 percent by 2020 from 3 percent in 2005.

"A minus 25 percent target by 2020 includes both domestic cuts and cuts from the rest of the world," Fukuyama said, adding that the division between the two would be decided later.

The target would be part of the party's policy manifesto, which it aims to release after parliament is dissolved, most likely next week, he said.

U.S. BILL IN FOCUS

Fukuyama said he would keep a close eye on developments in the global carbon emissions market and progress on a new U.S. climate bill, which would introduce carbon trading as a tool to help cut U.S. emissions by 17 percent below 2005 by 2020.

The bill, which the House of Representatives passed last month, could boost the global carbon market because it allows companies to use carbon offsets from abroad to meet abatement targets.

President Barack Obama has demanded Congress send him a climate bill before year's end.

Earlier this month, the Group of Eight rich nations and the Major Economies Forum, whose 17 members produce most of the world's carbon emissions, both backed a goal of limiting global warming to no more than two degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels.

But India and top emitter China refused to sign up a G8-supported goal of halving world emissions by 2050. Hurdles include finding a way to finance a switch to cleaner energy in poorer nations and paying for climate change adaptation.

Aso said last month Japan's 2020 target would be met solely through domestic efforts to save energy and use renewable energy.

The minus 15 percent target versus 2005 is equivalent to a cut of only 8 percent below 1990 levels.

"It just doesn't go far enough," Fukuyama said. "How can they dare to persuade China and India with that number?"

(Reporting by Risa Maeda; Additional reporting by Yoko Kubota; Editing by David Fogarty)