Young Japanese sue utility companies over climate impact October 18, 2024

Goi Thermal Power Plant in Chiba Prefecture | Reuters

By AFP -Agence France Presse

Young Japanese sue utility companies over climate impact

A group of 16 young Japanese people are suing utility companies over their carbon emissions in the latest global case of activists using the courts to push for action against climate change.

The plaintiffs, all in their teens and 20s, say it is the first case brought by young people in Japan, which, according to the campaigners, has the dirtiest energy matrix among the Group of Seven nations.

The lawsuit was filed in August against ten power plant operators who burn fossil fuels whose emissions are incompatible with Japan's climate commitments, their lawyers said.

The first hearing is scheduled for October 24.

The lawsuit aims to protect young people “from the dangerous and negative impacts of climate change,” which is a “violation of their human rights and the rights of future generations,” the lawyers said in a statement.

They added that the defendants' self-imposed emissions reduction targets for 2030 are “grossly inadequate” and rely on “technically unproven technologies” such as burning coal mixed with ammonia or storing carbon dioxide underground.

Two companies named in the lawsuit, Jera and Electric Power Development, declined to comment on the ongoing legal proceedings.

The government is expected to release updated emissions reduction targets this fiscal year for the world's fourth-largest economy by 2035.

Currently, around two-thirds of its electricity comes from fossil fuels, but the country is striving to achieve “carbon neutrality” by 2050 and to reduce emissions by 46% by 2030 from 2013 levels.

By 2030, Japan wants to almost double the share generated by renewable energies to 36% to 38%, reduce fossil fuels to 41%, and - 14 years after the Fukushima disaster - increase nuclear power to 20% to 22%.

In August, South Korea's Constitutional Court ruled that a large part of the country's climate targets were unconstitutional, giving a historic victory to young environmental activists.

The first case of its kind in Asia, brought by children and teenagers who named an embryo as the lead plaintiff, claimed that South Korea's climate commitments were insufficient and unfulfilled, violating their human rights.

Similar cases have been successful elsewhere, including in April when the European Court of Human Rights ruled that Switzerland was not doing enough to deal with climate change following a case brought by a group of 2,500 women with an average age of 73.

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