INTERVIEW-Japan seeks CO2 goals from developing nations
(Adds byline, more comments, details)
By Risa Maeda
TOKYO, March 14 (Reuters) - Japan is calling on developing countries to come up with mid-term national goals to curb greenhouse gas emissions by improving energy efficiency of industries, a trade ministry official said on Friday.
Japan, the world's fifth-largest greenhouse gas emitter, says nations should share energy efficiency indicators of each industrial sector to assess how much they will be able to cut carbon dioxide emissions, the main gas blamed for global warming.
An improvement in end-use energy efficiency by sharing existing carbon-reducing technologies costs far less than introducing green energy like nuclear, and will be especially appropriate for fast-growing economies such as China and India.
"We think it is an approach which all major emitters will be able to take part in," said Toru Ishida, Director-General at the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry's (METI) Bureau for Industrial Science and Technology Policy and Environment.
"It is not putting a sector cap. It's adding up potential volume from each sector," he said in an interview with Reuters, referring to the bottom-up approach to set fair and equitable national goals.
"We think the process of assessment would make it easier for developing countries to find their own paths to fight global warming," he added.
The comments came as Japan hosts a three-day meeting in Chiba, next to Tokyo, of the world's top greenhouse gas polluters to work out ways to cut emissions, starting late on Friday.
The G20, ranging from top polluters the United States and China to Indonesia, Brazil and South Africa, emit about 80 percent of mankind's greenhouse gases.
FEW SUPPORTERS
But Japan's bottom-up approach to seek a global peak-out in the next 10 to 20 years attracts few supporters in U.N.-led talks on a new global climate pact.
Many countries say rich nations must take the lead by setting their own mid-term targets with deeper emission reductions as cutting poverty comes first in developing countries.
Some rich nations have shown their understanding as European Union leaders agreed last March to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent by 2020.
At a U.N. meeting in Vienna last August, rich nations agreed to consider emissions cuts of 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels as a non-binding starting point for their work on the global pact to extend the Kyoto Protocol beyond 2012.
But Japan has failed to elaborate its own mid-term target.
"We understand there has been such a discussion, but things regarding with this should be decided later in the negotiating process," Ishida said.
Japan has also started talks on introducing its own version of a cap-and-trade system with mandatory emissions limits, a system already in place in Europe.
But METI's Ishida said Japan is only looking into the feasibility of such a system as other measures were possible to reduce emissions in the post-Kyoto period.
"An alternative would be an enhanced version of the existing voluntary pledges on emission cuts from industries," he said.
The pledges, aiming to meet Japan's commitments under the Kyoto pact, are not legally bound. But missing a target would require an industry to pay a penalty to the government in a form of U.N. approved emission credits.
By Risa Maeda
TOKYO, March 14 (Reuters) - Japan is calling on developing countries to come up with mid-term national goals to curb greenhouse gas emissions by improving energy efficiency of industries, a trade ministry official said on Friday.
Japan, the world's fifth-largest greenhouse gas emitter, says nations should share energy efficiency indicators of each industrial sector to assess how much they will be able to cut carbon dioxide emissions, the main gas blamed for global warming.
An improvement in end-use energy efficiency by sharing existing carbon-reducing technologies costs far less than introducing green energy like nuclear, and will be especially appropriate for fast-growing economies such as China and India.
"We think it is an approach which all major emitters will be able to take part in," said Toru Ishida, Director-General at the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry's (METI) Bureau for Industrial Science and Technology Policy and Environment.
"It is not putting a sector cap. It's adding up potential volume from each sector," he said in an interview with Reuters, referring to the bottom-up approach to set fair and equitable national goals.
"We think the process of assessment would make it easier for developing countries to find their own paths to fight global warming," he added.
The comments came as Japan hosts a three-day meeting in Chiba, next to Tokyo, of the world's top greenhouse gas polluters to work out ways to cut emissions, starting late on Friday.
The G20, ranging from top polluters the United States and China to Indonesia, Brazil and South Africa, emit about 80 percent of mankind's greenhouse gases.
FEW SUPPORTERS
But Japan's bottom-up approach to seek a global peak-out in the next 10 to 20 years attracts few supporters in U.N.-led talks on a new global climate pact.
Many countries say rich nations must take the lead by setting their own mid-term targets with deeper emission reductions as cutting poverty comes first in developing countries.
Some rich nations have shown their understanding as European Union leaders agreed last March to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent by 2020.
At a U.N. meeting in Vienna last August, rich nations agreed to consider emissions cuts of 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels as a non-binding starting point for their work on the global pact to extend the Kyoto Protocol beyond 2012.
But Japan has failed to elaborate its own mid-term target.
"We understand there has been such a discussion, but things regarding with this should be decided later in the negotiating process," Ishida said.
Japan has also started talks on introducing its own version of a cap-and-trade system with mandatory emissions limits, a system already in place in Europe.
But METI's Ishida said Japan is only looking into the feasibility of such a system as other measures were possible to reduce emissions in the post-Kyoto period.
"An alternative would be an enhanced version of the existing voluntary pledges on emission cuts from industries," he said.
The pledges, aiming to meet Japan's commitments under the Kyoto pact, are not legally bound. But missing a target would require an industry to pay a penalty to the government in a form of U.N. approved emission credits.
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