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© (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2017.Japan fires up biomass energy, but fuel shortage looms
By Yuka Obayashi TOKYO©2024 GPlusMedia Inc.
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wtfjapan
so the massive investment in solar and its still only at around 4% of the total. now they want to burn huge amounts of wood creating huge amounts of CO2. Japan has a long way to go to even make a dent in its CO2 output and dream of make baseload power in renewables is just that a dream. People still harp on about banning nuclear power yet Japan will struggle to even make the 24% target in renewable by 2030. reality is setting in for the tree huggers, now they want to burn those same trees as renewables . LOL
Mlodinow
Burning imported biomass should not count as "renewable".
Japan was never a great choice for solar due to its terrain and climate, but the cost of wind/off-shore-wind around the world is now for the first time dropping below the cost of nuclear. Biomass is only popular here because Japan is a manufacturer of biomass fired plants. Luckily, MHI (through a JV) now also produce excellent off-shore wind turbines. Watch for that to be subsidized next.
Jonathan Prin
Importing wood pellets from abroad is environmental non-sense. It may be economically profitable for a while thanks to subsidies but target should be to develop management of forests for that purpose of producing biomass. Japan has some, limited but surely insufficiently exploited.
I am buying shares in forests in my country as I am sure it is a LT viable target for many countries to reduce CO2.
Brian Wheway
You can grow willow trees they grow quickly and they are used for bio mass in the UK, but you could use bamboo in Japan, it grows fast and can be easily harvested,
Scrote
If biomass burning increases then the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere will also increase. Even if they say the CO2 will be absorbed by new growth the CO2 in the air will never be reduced by burning biomass. Wood also has a low energy density and isn't a good source of energy.
There's a reason the UK government refuse to release their own report into burning biomass: the results show it's environmentally unsound.