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Timing is everything in politics, but evidently nobody told . Japan’s deputy prime minister picked an unfortunate time to scale back on planned emissions cuts, given that carbon dioxide levels over parts of Japan just hit an all-time high (see “Carbon dioxide levels reach a new milestone“).

In 2009, then prime minister Yukio Hatoyama promised that Japan would . But on 30 May, . The government is now considering setting a new target.

The problem is the shutdown of Japan’s nuclear reactors. Following the earthquake and tsunami in March 2011, and the ensuing crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, they have been powered down for safety tests. Japan’s last operational reactor went offline on 5 May, and proposals to restart reactors have .

As a result, Japan has had to fall back on fossil fuels. According to the , , oil and gas in the first four months of 2012 than in the same period in 2011. A rise in the country’s greenhouse gas emissions was inevitable.

The environment ministry’s Central Environment Council says that without nuclear power, . If nuclear power plants were switched back on, however, Japan could .