TPT September 2012

Global Marketplace

That the prospective new power is about equal to the output of three atomic reactors is significant. Atomic energy provided some 30 per cent of Japan’s power before the nuclear crisis that followed the earthquake and tsunami of March 2011. Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda’s effort to cut dependence on atomic energy benefits the domestic solar industry at a time when its European counterparts have been suffering incentive cuts. “The tariff is very attractive,” Mina Sekiguchi, associate partner at the accounting group KPMG in Japan, told the Times . “The rate reflects the government’s intention to set up many solar power stations very quickly.” Under the new programme, utilities will buy solar, biomass, wind, geothermal and hydro power. All costs will be passed on to consumers in surcharges, which the government said will average out at $1.09 a month per household: down from its previous estimate of $1.25. › The solar initiative is not without its detractors. It is, Ms Watanabe observed, raising concern among Japanese business groups that promoting clean power will raise bills and slow the economic recovery. One sceptic is Masami Hasegawa, senior manager of the environmental policy bureau of Keidanren, Japan’s most powerful business lobby, which counts Toyota Motor Corp and Nippon Steel Corp among its members. “This is a mechanism with a high degree of market intervention by setting tariffs artificially high and making users shoulder the cost,” Mr Hasegawa said. “We question the effectiveness of such a scheme.”

Energy Japan is poised to overtake Italy to become the world’s second- biggest market for solar power The Japan Times on 4 July took note that Japan is about to become the No 2 solar market after Germany — the global leader by installations. Citing a Bloomberg New Energy Finance forecast, Chisaki Watanabe reported from Tokyo that new government incentives are driving sales for equipment makers like Kyocera and Sharp. Industry Minister Yukio Edano on 18 June set a premium price for solar electricity that is about triple what industrial users now pay for conventional power. Utilities will pay about a half-dollar a kilowatt hour (kWh) for 20 years to solar power producers, almost twice the rate in Germany. Bloomberg believes that could spur at least $9.5bn in new installations adding 3.2 gigawatts (gW) of capacity. A gigawatt is enough to supply about 243,000 homes in Japan. The country ranked sixth worldwide by new solar installations last year, when it added 1.3gW to bring its installed base to five gigawatts. Japanese builders next year will erect another 3.2gW to 4.7gW, London-based New Energy Finance forecasts.

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September 2012