Japan has one of the highest installed renewable energy capacities in the world. The country is also one of the world’s largest consumers of energy. Lacking its own fossil fuel resources, it relies on imports for nearly all of its supply. This dependence on imports makes the country vulnerable to …
Environment ministers and representatives from the Group of Seven countries began a two-day meeting Sunday, with host and chair Japan calling for “concrete action” to implement a landmark climate deal reached in Paris last year and other environmental policies. “We saw major progress in environmental policies internationally last year, such …
Fault damage zones record the integrated deformation caused by repeated slip on faults and reflect the conditions that control slip behavior. To investigate the Japan Trench décollement, we characterized the damage zone close to the fault from drill core recovered during Integrated Ocean Drilling Program Expedition 343 (Japan Trench Fast …
Visitors to Japan rarely encounter the usual markers of privation. Housing is not run down. The urban homeless are out of sight, in makeshift tents in public parks or down by river banks. Japanese cherish a belief that theirs is an egalitarian society. So high poverty among children should come …
A recent survey by the Nagoya Municipal Government revealed that more than 80 percent of foreign residents in the city are aware of the risks of a Nankai mega-thrust earthquake and the devastation it would bring to the area. The 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake made many foreigners realize the …
More than 1,000 seismic events had been recorded in Kumamoto and Oita prefectures by Thursday in the two weeks since a magnitude-6.5 earthquake struck southwestern Japan, while over 30,000 people remain evacuated from their homes. The frequency of the seismic events, ranging from minor jolts to the M7.3 quake that …
Environment ministers from Japan, China and South Korea agreed Wednesday to cooperate on management and reuse of disaster waste, with Tokyo offering to share its experience from the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami that hit northeastern Japan and other disasters. “Japan would prepare an opportunity among the three countries to …
More radical action is needed to decarbonize the world's energy supply and improve energy efficiency to keep the global temperature rise to below 2 degrees Celsius, the Energy Transitions Commission (ETC) said on Wednesday. The ETC is made up of global experts from energy companies, the investment sector, public and …
MADISON, Wis. -- In 1442, 50 years before Columbus "sailed the ocean blue," Shinto priests in Japan began keeping records of the annual freeze dates of a nearby lake. Along a Finnish river, starting in 1693, local merchants recorded the date the ice broke up each spring. These observations are …
The Japanese government formally decided Tuesday to sign the Paris Agreement, a long-sought international framework negotiated with the aim of making efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions legally binding. At a signing ceremony to be held Friday at the U.N. headquarters in New York, at least 130 countries, including major …
At least two persons died and more than 50 were injured, according to police, by strong winds that battered Japan on Sunday. In Ishikawa Prefecture on the Sea of Japan coast, a 66-year-old man died after falling over in the wind and striking his head, while another six people were …
Scores of people were feared buried alive Saturday after two powerful quakes hit Kumamoto Prefecture in Kyushu a day apart, killing at least 37 people, and as a forecast storm threatened more devastating landslides. The magnitude-7.3 temblor, which struck at 1:25 a.m. Saturday, registered upper 6 on Japan’s seismic scale …
Nine people have been killed and 860 others injured after a powerful earthquake jolted southwestern Japan on Thursday night, local police said Friday. The magnitude-6.5 quake at 9:26 p.m. originated at a depth of around 11 kilometers in Kumamoto Prefecture and registered a maximum 7 on the Japanese seismic scale …
Japan's greenhouse gas emissions fell 3.1 percent to a three-year low in the fiscal year ended March 2015, due to reduced power demand and growing use of renewables, revised government figures showed on Friday. Emissions fell for the first time in five years to 1.364 billion metric tonnes of CO2 …
A new report has concluded that even the most efficient coal plants are incompatible with global climate change goals. With world leaders heading to New York to sign the Paris Climate Change Agreement, a new report conducted by Ecofys and commissioned by WWF has concluded that any level of coal-fired …
Japan has some of the worst wealth inequality and highest rates of child poverty among the world’s developed nations, according to a UNICEF report unveiled Thursday, which ranked the nation 34th out of 41. The report, titled “Fairness for Children: A league table of inequality in child well-being in rich …
Japan is considering releasing thousands of tonnes of radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean from the beleaguered Fukushima plant. The nuclear power station, north of Tokyo, was wrecked by a 50-foot tsunami in March 2011, disabling three of its reactors. To keep the melted-down reactors cool, 300 tonnes of water …
Nuclear catastrophe is always an unmitigated disaster. The only beneficiaries, albeit in a perverse fashion, are animals, which tend to flourish in areas humans evacuate. This has certainly been the case for wild boars around Fukushima, which have multiplied so rapidly, they’ve become a problem for neighboring towns. On Friday, …
Japan’s utilities are reserving capacity for nuclear power on their grids even though all but two of the nation’s reactors remain closed with little prospect of many others restarting, according to a Reuters survey. The practice risks complicating the biggest overhaul in the history of Japan’s power industry that started …
Japanese scientists said Saturday they have bioengineered the skin organ known as the integumentary system in mice using induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells. The achievement is likely to lead to further progress in regenerative medicine to treat severe burns, skin diseases and hair loss as the organ contains all the …
India and Japan have reportedly reached a preliminary understanding to sign a civil nuclear cooperation agreement after certain technical details are finalised. However domestic politics of Japan, anti-nuclear groups and India’s reluctance to join the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty are some of the concerns that would have to be addressed before …
