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Climate Action

Japan Democrats support CO2 cuts via global market

Japan's main opposition Democratic Party says it will adopt bolder cuts in greenhouse gas emissions than the current government by using global emissions market and increasing green jobs at home if it wins an upcoming general election as it looks likely to do.

  • 15 July 2009
  • Simione Talanoa

Japan's main opposition Democratic Party says it will adopt bolder cuts in greenhouse gas emissions than the current government by using the global emissions market and increasing green jobs at home if it wins an upcoming general election as it looks likely to do.

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

The Democrat's vice policy chief, Tetsuro Fukuyama, said the party's 2020 target to cut Japanese emissions by 25 percent below 1990 would be met both by imposing restrictions and offering incentives to spur companies to invest in energy conservation, increase their use of renewable energy and develop green technology.

The party's goal would also be met by other measures, including buying carbon credits from emission cuts in developing countries, Fukuyama said in an interview on Wednesday.

"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.

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Source: Reuters