Japan:

Renewable Energy’s Future in Japan Rosy if Grids Ever Get Updated (Japan Times)

(Courtesy CIA.gov)

The March 11, 2011, mega-quake and monster tsunami that set off the Fukushima No. 1 atomic plant meltdowns forced Japan to rethink its nuclear-focused energy policy and explore the use of renewable energy sources, including geothermal.

“I think wind and geothermal are the keys (to spreading renewable energy) as they are more cost-efficient than solar . . . (the investment) trend will be shifting to them, too,” said Shinichiro Takiguchi, an energy policy expert who is senior manager at the center for the strategy of emergence at the private Japan Research Institute.

Japan has the world’s third-biggest potential for output at 23.4 million kw, after the U.S. and Indonesia, according to the Agency for Natural Resources and Energy.

However, places suitable for wind and geothermal power production tend to be rural, but power grids — the networks of high-transmission cables by which electricity is distributed through a region — are not yet fully developed and lack the capacity to transmit the vast power being generated by wind farms.

“This lack of power grids is a problem for all kinds of renewable energy sources,” he said.

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