Japan’s Green Growth Strategy supports 2050 carbon neutrality

On 25 December 2020, Japan unveiled its Green Growth Strategy to support the overarching target set by the Prime Minister in October 2020: make Japan carbon neutral by 2050.

The Green Growth Strategy towards 2050 Carbon Neutrality sets targets for 14 priority fields and formulates action plans that include comprehensive policy measures in areas such as budgets, taxes, regulatory reforms, standardisation, and international cooperation. The strategy aims to trigger an annual growth of 90 trillion yen (700 million euros) by 2030 and 190 trillion yen (1.5 billion euros) by 2050.

The 14 priority fields are:

• Offshore wind (wind turbines, components, floating turbines)
• Ammonia fuel (transition period to the hydrogen society)
• Hydrogen (hydrogen power generation, hydrogen-fueled steelmaking, hydrogen carrier ships, electrolyzers)
• Nuclear power (small modular reactors, hydrogen production from nuclear)
• Mobility and batteries (electric vehicles, fuel cell vehicles, next generation batteries)
• Semiconductors and ICT (data centres, energy-efficient semiconductors)
• Maritime transport (hydrogen ships, electric ships, gas-fueled ships)
• Logistics (smart transportation, logistics drones, hydrogen machinery for construction)
• Food, agriculture, forestry and fisheries (smart agriculture, high-rise wood construction, blue carbon)
• Aviation (hybrid electric aircrafts, hydrogen aircrafts)
• Carbon recycling (concrete, biofuels, plastics)
• Next generation solar panels for housing and building (perovskite solar cells)
• Resource circularity (biomaterials, recycled materials, power generation from waste)
• Lifestyle industry (local decarbonisation of businesses)

The strategy’s targets include trippling the share of renewable power to at least 50% by 2050, phasing out sales of new gasoline-only cars by 2035 and increasing hydrogen consumption across all industries to around 20 million metric tons a year by 2050.

Sources: European Cluster Collaboration Platform. Energyworld.com, METI (Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry), POLITICO