U.S.-Japan Climate Partnership Fact Sheet

Recognizing that the path to energy security runs through clean energy, the United States and Japan intend to build on their cooperation to increase climate ambition, including through decarbonization and clean energy, and continue to lead on their respective domestic climate efforts and on accelerating international climate action. The two sides intend to reinforce bilateral cooperation in the priority areas below to achieve their 2050 net zero goals and their aligned 2030 nationally determined contributions (NDCs) under the Paris Agreement, alongside promoting a global trajectory consistent with keeping global temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius within reach.

The two sides intend to further cooperate and accelerate respective action by:

• Exchanging views regarding respective domestic planning for, and implementation of, policies to achieve their respective 2030 NDCs under the Paris Agreement and 2050 net zero emission goals;
• Working to, in line with their respective climate finance pledges, continue contributing to fully delivering on the goal of developed countries to jointly mobilize $100 billion in climate finance as soon as possible, in line with the Climate Finance Delivery Plan, including enhancing action on the ten principles for collective actions identified therein;
• Advancing efforts to make financial flows consistent with the global achievement of net zero greenhouse gas emissions no later than 2050, with deep emission reductions in the 2020s and climate-resilient development;
• Working to ensure there is no new direct government support for unabated international coal-fired power generation and to rapidly scale-up technologies and policies that further accelerate the transition away from unabated coal capacity to an overwhelmingly decarbonized power system in the 2030s, consistent with our 2030 NDCs and net zero commitments, while ensuring stable energy supply;
• Advancing rapid decarbonization of on-road transport, including by working to achieve a significant market share for zero-emission vehicles in the light duty sector by 2030, by reducing emissions from medium and heavy-duty vehicles and by promoting innovation for various technologies;
• Enhancing cooperation bilaterally and through multilateral fora to address climate-related financial risks and opportunities, including by promoting consistent and comparable mandatory disclosure of climate-related information that is decision-useful for investors;
• Continuing to enhance efforts and cooperation in innovation and advanced technology deployment, including in such areas as renewable energy, energy storage (such as batteries and long-duration energy storage technologies), smart grids, building electrification, energy efficiency, clean hydrogen, clean ammonia, carbon capture utilization and storage/carbon recycling, industrial decarbonization, and advanced nuclear power, including small modular reactors; and advancing collaboration under the U.S.-Japan Clean Energy and Energy Security Initiative (CEESI), including several new bilateral task forces for accelerating offshore wind, geothermal energy technologies and nuclear power;
• Collaborating in the First Movers Coalition (FMC), where the United States welcomes Japan as a government partner and steering board member, and recognizing that Japan’s participation in the First Movers Coalition, a flagship initiative launched at COP26 to drive demand for green innovation across hard-to-abate sectors, will help elevate the role of Japanese companies in these efforts, align public investment and demand with green innovation in FMC sectors, and provide supportive policies to help scale up supply to meet FMC demand signals;
• Collaborating to accelerate the deployment of heat pumps in our respective domestic markets and globally to displace fuel burned in buildings and advance energy security and climate goals through electrification of space and water heating in buildings, for example through support for manufacturing, training, and promotion;
• Advancing collaboration to accelerate subnational action including under the Global Subnational Zero Carbon Promotion Initiative by continuing the Zero Carbon City International Forum, sharing best practices and considering opportunities for collaborative actions in third countries;
• Coordinating closely on our diplomatic efforts toward all major economies’ taking bold actions in the 2020s to keep a 1.5 degree Celsius limit on warming within reach, including through the Major Economies Forum and the G20;
• Enhancing collaboration on the implementation of Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, including through capacity building activities on high integrity carbon markets by sharing best practices and lessons learned;
• Pursuing opportunities to cooperate on fully utilizing existing nuclear power, and to advance innovative nuclear power technologies, including strengthening industrial partnerships and deepening successful capacity building cooperation in third countries under the Foundational Infrastructure for the Responsible Use of Small Modular Reactor Technology (FIRST) program;
• Enhancing cooperation to address methane emissions globally, recognizing the importance of the Global Methane Pledge and rapid global action to address methane; and by implementing domestic methane emission reduction based on respective national plans, and encouraging those countries that do not have such plans to develop them, and to pursue opportunities to provide financial and technical assistance to assist third countries to meet their methane reduction targets; and the U.S., as one of the largest producers and Japan, as one of the largest consumers, intend to take action to reduce methane emissions from production and consumption. Japan intends to share knowledge and information on technology to reduce methane emission through a Quad roundtable event focused on the oil and gas sector;
• Working to accelerate deployment of offshore wind installations, both at home and in third countries, and seeking partnerships to scale financing, improve policy conditions, and undertake relevant technical work, recognizing the U.S. goal to deploy 30 gigawatts (GW) of offshore wind by 2030, and Japan’s goal to deploy 10 GW of offshore wind by 2030;
• Securing resilient and diverse supply chains of critical minerals to support energy security and the clean energy transition;
• Collaborating on greening government initiatives with the aim of using the procurement power of our respective national governments to achieve ambitious goals, including procuring carbon-free electricity, acquiring zero-emission light-duty vehicles, constructing net-zero emission buildings, and upgrading lighting to high-efficiency lighting, contributing to net-zero emissions by 2050 through greening overall national government operations;
• Building on established deep cooperation on the decarbonization of the shipping sector to promote the demonstration, deployment, and adoption of low- and zero- emission lifecycle fuels and technologies for shipping, recognizing that decarbonizing the shipping sector is essential to transitioning to a clean energy economy; advancing ocean-based climate actions such as green shipping corridors and supply for zero-emission shipping;
• Cooperating to accelerate the transition to decarbonized and lower-methane economies in third countries, particularly in the Indo-Pacific, including through:

  The Japan-U.S. Clean Energy Partnership (JUCEP), which advances the deployment of renewable energy and decarbonization technologies in the Indo-Pacific through partnerships with the private sector, and; The Japan-U.S. Mekong Power Partnership, or JUMPP, which supports the Mekong’s energy security while encouraging greater regional power trade, renewable energy integration, and power market development.