To Reduce GHG Emissions, Japan Ups the Temperature in Offices

In a typically conservative business culture, asking men not to wear a suit and tie to work didn't go over well at first.  The reasoning was to ease up on the use of air conditioners in office buildings, thereby reducing energy consumption and GHG emissions.  When the Cool Biz initiative was launched June 1, 2005, top government officials came to work without jackets and ties, overturning a decades-old tradition.

Since then, air conditioners have been set to higher temperatures, and an 82-degree setting has been mandated in all of Japan's government buildings.  The first year of the program, half a million tons of CO2 that would have normally been released into the atmosphere, was not.  And last year the number of companies and numbers of businessmen who participated in the Cool Biz initiative expanded enormously, cutting about 1.4 million tons of CO2 emissions.

That means that by easing up on the usage of air conditioners, Japan has reduced GHG emissions by as much as Tokyo emits in a month.  Sounds like a step in the right direction, especially for a country struggling to keep up with the Kyoto Protocol.

Japan has pledged under the Kyoto Protocol to reduce its GHG emissions to 6% below 1990 levels. Instead, emissions have grown 8%. The Cool Biz savings amount to 0.1%.

Would you be willing to sweat it out to reduce GHG emissions?  Let me know what you think.

By Cassandra Darwin
cdarwin@enviance.com