Panel presents 8-17% CO2 cut target for 2020, last of 6 options

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TOKYO, April 14 Kyodo -
A government study panel on Tuesday presented a national greenhouse gas
reduction target of 8 to 17 percent by 2020 from 1990 levels, the last of six
options the government will study before determining Japan's 2020 target by
June.
The 8 to 17 percent target was set on the assumption that each developed
country spends the same amount of money in relation to the size of its gross
domestic product to slash emissions by 25 percent for industrial economies as a
group by 2020 below 1990 levels.
The panel, chaired by former Bank of Japan Governor Toshihiko Fukui, also
fine-tuned two of five other targets the panel already presented.
One option involves a range of 1 percent increase to a 5 percent reduction,
changed from a previously proposed range of zero to 3 percent contraction.
Another option seeks a 15 percent cut, slightly changed from a 15 to 16 percent
decrease as previously envisaged.
Three other options are a 4 percent increase, a 7 percent decrease and a 25
percent reduction.
A 2020 target is seen as crucial for Japan and other countries because it is a
major focus of U.N. negotiations for a successor treaty to the carbon-capping
Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012. The talks are scheduled to conclude at a
key U.N. climate change conference in Copenhagen in December.
Japan has already pledged to slash its emissions 60 to 80 percent by 2050 from
current levels.
==Kyodo