Japan reacts and evolves

Japan’s energy economy is pulsating – under the weight of its past, imprisoned by imports, and a desire to innovate

"The economy struggled after Fukushima. We've had to recalibrate our energy economy entirely." Ken Koyama, managing director and senior economist at Japan's Institute of Energy Economics, is speaking. We're in the Inui building in the Kachidoki region of Tokyo, where government offices dominate the landscape. It's here that the country's ministers had to decide - fast - how to bring energy back on line as disaster struck five years ago. "We had planned blackouts. Given the circumstances, we dealt with it well - but we needed an instantaneous rebuilding process." The earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan's Pacific coast on 11 March 2011 changed the country forever, leaving its energy economy