Greenbang points out that “24 Japanese power and energy-related companies have jointly launched a research company to develop carbon capture and storage technologies.”
The companies, each investing 3 million yen, include 10 power utilities, and seven oil-related companies, as well as civil engineering firms, steelmakers and chemicals firms. Greenmonk is a big believer in collaborative innovation, particularly across organisational boundaries.
Japan has a history of successfully retooling its economy to deal with economic challenges and scarcity (see Collapse by Jared Diamond). Its a country with a particularly strong sense of duty and continuity. The Japanese government is targeting an annual reduction of 100 million tons in carbon dioxide emissions through CCS technologies in 2020. That’s a start.
Interesting. I especially like how you call out the cultural element. Plenty of environmental challenges that we *think of* as being technical problems — or *primarily* technical problems — are as much cultural as anything else.
Easy case in point: the American love affair with the car. Yes, it’s convenient to drive yourself where you want, when you want, or at least it’s convenient when gas is cheap and traffic is low. But in the U.S., the attachment to the car — and a car for every driver, even — goes far beyond any simple calculation of utility.
Savvy environmental thinkers will continue to shape their actions with broader cultural challenges in mind. It’s not enough to come up with a technical solution — you have to promote technical solutions that are culturally DOable.
This applies just as well, by the way, to corporate cultures as it does to national cultures.