Article content continued

Japan’s new policy was widely criticized in Warsaw, where some 190 nations are meeting from Nov. 11-22 to work on a global climate pact, due to be agreed in 2015.

China’s climate negotiator Su Wei said: “I have no way of describing my dismay” about the revised target.

The European Union also expressed disappointment and said it expected all nations to stick to promised cuts as part of efforts to halt global warming.

“It is regrettable,” Christiana Figueres, the UN’s climate chief, told Reuters of Japan’s goal. But she predicted that Japan’s planned investments in energy efficiency and renewable power would prove that the target could be toughened.

“This move by Japan could have a devastating impact,” said Naoyuki Yamagishi of environmental campaign group WWF Japan. “It could further accelerate the race to the bottom among other developed countries.”

Climate Analytics, a think-tank, said Japan could still achieve a 17-18% CO2 reduction from 2005 levels by 2020 even if it replaced nuclear with its current fossil fuel mix.

CRACKS

The news comes as it was revealed that the Fukushima reactor may have been damaged even before the 2011 disasters.

Three of the spent fuel assemblies due to be carefully plucked from the crippled Japanese nuclear plant at Fukushima in a hazardous year-long operation were damaged even before the 2011 earthquake and tsunami that knocked out the facility.

The plant’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co, or Tepco, said the damaged assemblies – 4.5 metre high racks containing 50-70 thin rods of highly irradiated used fuel – can’t be removed from Fukushima’s Reactor No. 4 using the large cask assigned to taking out more than 1,500 of the assemblies.