The cure for a decade of economic stagnation may be the focal point of Sunday's general election, but Tetsunari Iida wants politicians to put energy and environment high on the political agenda as well.
"Compared with Europe, where the political agenda is balanced on the issues of environment, energy, human rights, labor and the economy, Japanese politicians talk 99 percent about the economy without a visionary philosophy," said Iida, who is leading a grass-roots movement to use more renewable energy sources such as wind power, solar energy and biomass.
The senior researcher in charge of environmental and energy policy at Japan Research Institute Ltd. is calling for the "democratization of the energy policy" in the wake of a chain of nuclear power-related accidents and the expiration of Japan's drilling rights in a major Saudi Arabian oil field.