Late night beers and cup noodles – The latest casualties in the fight against global warming
During the COP3 event of December 1997, in Kyoto, Japan committed itself to a reduction of greenhouse emissions by 6%. With this goal set the local governments of at least 10 prefectures have recently announced the bold plans to restrict the opening hours of some of Japan’s forty two thousand convenience stores.
According to press reports the local governments are considering curbing late night operations of the stores as a step towards reducing their energy usage and carbon dioxide emissions. The debate over restricting operating hours began in Kyoto City this year. The city plans to establish a panel review in co-operation with convenience store owners to discuss the new opening hours for the next fiscal year, a sentiment mirrored by Saitama, Kanagawa and other prefectures.
Kiyoshi Hijikata, chairman of the Japan Franchise Association (JFA), estimates that cutting store opening hours by one third would reduce the industry’s carbon dioxide emissions by a mere 4%.
Logistical operations such as merchandise transportation are typically conducted at night during quiet periods. These would have to be moved to daytime hours during times of higher traffic congestion. In addition to this a large portion of the store’s electrical systems including security and refrigeration would remain on during the closed hours.
By far the largest operator of 24hour convenience stores in Japan is Seven-Eleven Japan Co., Ltd which, as of 2007 operated over twelve thousand stores nation-wide. Company president Toshiro Yamaguchi expressed his regrets that the local governments had made these proposals without prior talks with industry representatives. In a statement Yamaguchi said that these new operating hours could reduce each stores profits by 20%. “If this happens, our current business model will lose its foundation”.
The amount of CO2 released from all of the Japanese convenience stores amounted to an estimated 0.2% of Japan’s CO2 emissions. An official from the JFA said that even if all stores were to reduce their opening times to 16 hours, the lost CO2 would “only amount to 0.009 percent” of the nation’s total.
Local governments have been eager to present original and innovative climate change solutions in the wake of 2008’s G8 summit in Hokkaido. However, these new proposals make no mention of Japan’s many thousands of twenty four-hour fast food restaurants, Internet cafes, Pachinko parlous and Manga cafes.
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This is retarded. Hands off our combinis!
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Better yet, shutdown the stupid government offices – besides saving energy, think of all the hot air it will eliminate.
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This is a foolish idea. Japan will lay itself bare in order to curb emissions, but the fact remains that the rest of the world doesn’t give a rats ass about Kyoto.
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Ridiculous idea.
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If you think that this is a silly idea you may wish to look at Japan`s rather substantial subsidised rice surplus (currently 1.5 million tons*) and consider how much CO2 was involved in its production.
*Source: http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/rc20001011a3.htm
This will surely make combinis less combini-ent.
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Idiotic idea. I hope this doesn’t come to reality.
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GAIJIN AGAINST COMBINI CLOSURES! FIGHT FOR YOUR RIGHT TO MIDNIGHT CHU HI!
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Why don’t they start by actually regulating the dirty ass pitch-black exhaust that big-wheelers spew out? I can’t believe some of these trucks being permitted to operate. What’s all that shaken business about?!
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before thinking about cutting back open hours, how about reducing the number of lights inside in the first place? even in the middle of day all those conbinis/drug stores are BLINDINGLY bright inside with excessive lighting. (i’m looking at you (with my hand shading my eyes), daikoku!)
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Dark eyes absorb more light, causing less reflection scatter where light is received in the eye. Basically, that means that the Japanese majority with their dark brown eyes perceive rooms to be darker than people with light-brown, green, gray, hazel, or blue eyes.
Having green eyes myself, I also find myself squinting outside much more than the average Japanese person, and I prefer natural soft-yellow lighting indoors, whereas many Japanese guests complain that it is “dark”.
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Yeah, I know what you mean. I find the sunlight in this region to be incredibly bright (I’m from NW U.S.) but I notice Japanese don’t seem to mind.
I guess all those (white) gaijin wearing sunglasses aren’t just trying to look cool.
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Well, I’m アジア系, and my eyes are pretty dark brown, so the dark vs. light eye color argument doesn’t hold up for me. I agree that the sunlight here is harsh compared to where I’m from (NE U.S.!), so maybe people who grew up here have adapted to it.
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So, it’s official, there are no engineers advising the environmentalists in governments. Just a bunch of cranky old people who wake up at 5AM each morning and go to bed at sundown, uable to conceive that the world has gone 24-hour. They want to target/control the combinis, because they have a grudge, since conbinis killed off most of the small mom and pop grocery stores they feel nostalgic for.
Probably the biggest source of energy consumption in a conbini is the refrigetators and the HVAC system.
Requiring combinis to keep outside doors closed and not crank the AC to 20 degrees all summer long would be a real way to cut down on energy. Or even install clear plastic flaps over the refrigerated displays that just wastefully spill cold air onto the floor 24 hours a day.
24-hour conbinis are essential, not only for shopping, but also, in this age of unstaffed koban and do-nothing cops, as a kind of 24-hour refuge where you can find at least another human being who is prbably more likely to help you than a Koban Keystone.
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Those are all very good points.
Everything in a conbini is wrapped in at least two pieces of plastic. How about not throwing chopsticks, mini-spoons, forks, and napkins wrapped in more plastic into my bag while I’m fishing for change?
If Japan would stop with the double, triple and quadruple wrappings emissions could be cut DRASTICALLY. Stop wrapping fruit in plastic and styrofoam. Stop putting cookies into individuals bags and then into a bag and then into a box wrapped in plastic.
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I love japan….but its sad they are all wrapped up in this global warming bullshit.
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