Japan, the world’s second-largest car exporter, risks a 14% drop in GDP if it does not move more swiftly toward producing electric vehicles, according to a new report by the Climate Group.

气候组织的一份新报告显示:作为世界第二大汽车出口国,如果日本不加快生产电动汽车的步伐,其国内生产总值可能会下降14%。

The Climate Group is a non-profit founded in 2003 with the intent to inspire global climate action. The group commissioned two early leaders in the Japanese EV industry to help with this report – Kenichiro Wada, who headed Mitubishi’s i-MiEV project and founded the Japan Electrification Institute, and Professor Masato Inoue, design director of the original Nissan Leaf and professor at the Institute of Design in Turin.

气候组织是一家非营利组织,成立于2003年,致力于激励全球气候行动。该组织委托日本电动汽车行业的两位早期领导者来帮助撰写了这份报告——和田健一郎,曾经领导了三菱的i-MiEV项目,并创立了日本电气化研究所;井上正人教授,日产聆风原作的设计总监,也是都灵设计研究所的教授。

The report shows the status of auto sales in various regions, with Japan lagging behind major markets in Europe, China, and the United States in terms of domestic EV sales. Japan’s domestic hybrid (HEV) sales are going relatively strong, but the country sells very few battery-electric (BEV) and plug-in hybrid (PHEV) vehicles.

报告显示了各个地区的汽车销售状况,在国内电动汽车销售方面,日本落后于欧洲、中国和美国等主要市场。日本国内的混合动力汽车销售相对强劲,但纯电动汽车和插电式混合动力汽车的销量非常少。

Looking forward, the report notes that many major car markets are planning to reduce or eliminate the sale of internal combustion engine vehicles some time in the 2030s. This will be necessary to meet international climate targets which Japan itself have committed to.

报告指出,预计未来许多主要汽车市场计划在本世纪30年代减少或取消内燃机汽车销售。这对于实现日本承诺的国际气候目标是必要的。

And if Japan doesn’t match these targets, the risk to Japanese industry, and thus the Japanese economy, is large. The report notes that Japan, already reliant on auto manufacturing for almost a fifth of its exports, could risk losing half of those automotive exports leading to the loss of 1.72 million jobs and $6 billion in automotive profits through 2040 and resulting in a 14% drop in GDP.

如果日本达不到这些目标,日本工业乃至日本经济面临的风险就会很大。报告指出,日本出口额的近五分之一都是汽车制造业,而到2040年日本的汽车出口可能会失去一半,这将导致172万个工作岗位减少和60亿美元的汽车利润减少,GDP下降14%。

Japan lags behind others’ targets

日本落后于其他国家的目标

Japan’s domestic EV targets lag behind other major players. The EU will likely ban new internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles by 2035, the UK by 2030, and the United States and China want 50% of new car sales to have plugs by 2030 and 2035 respectively (though US voters want 100% EV by 2030). But Japan has only committed to “electrify” all new cars by the mid-2030s, which would include HEVs. This leaves the door open for up to 100% of its domestic sales to still be driven entirely by gasoline, with no ability to plug in to the grid for cleaner electricity.

日本国内的电动汽车目标落后于其他主要国家。,欧盟可能会在2035年禁止新内燃机汽车,英国可能会在2030年禁止,美国和中国分别希望到2030年和2035年50%的新车是插电式的(尽管美国选民希望到2030年实现100%电动汽车)。但日本只承诺到21世纪30年代中期实现所有新车“电气化”,其中包括混合动力汽车。这意味着,其国内销量仍有可能100%完全由汽油驱动,无法接入电网获得更清洁的电力。

Japan also refused to sign the COP26 2040 all-electric target (as did Germany and the United States, though some US states joined), which is a weak goal to begin with. As a result of Japan’s intransigence towards green energy and transportation, it received a “Fossil of the Day” award at last year’s climate conference.

日本也拒绝签署《联合国气候变化框架公约》第26次会议宣言,会议要求2040年实现全电动目标(德国和美国也没有签署,不过美国一些州加入了),这是个很小的目标。由于日本在绿色能源和交通方面的不妥协,它在去年的气候大会上获得了“每日化石奖”。

And, while the country itself is signatory to the Paris Agreement and the Glasgow Climate Pact, the captains of Japan’s automotive industry have shown significant resistance to these efforts. Akio Toyoda, CEO of Toyota, which is Japan’s largest company by far, often spreads EV misinformation, and the company pushes anti-EV propaganda both in advertisements and even in Japanese schools. The report notes that this misinformation is widespread in Japan, with popular perception being that HEVs are more efficient than BEVs, which is not correct.

尽管日本是《巴黎协定》和《格拉斯哥气候协定》的签署国,但日本汽车行业的巨头们对这些努力表现出了强烈的抵制。日本迄今为止最大的公司丰田汽车的首席执行官丰田章男经常传播电动汽车的错误信息,丰田汽车在广告中甚至在日本学校进行反电动汽车宣传。该报告指出,这种错误信息在日本普遍存在,人们普遍认为混合动力汽车比纯电动汽车更高效,而这是不正确的。

Japan does have quite conservative business culture – so change comes slowly, particularly if that change is being suggested by outside sources. Honda, Japan’s second-largest company, has historically not been much better than Toyota in this respect, but the company does seem to be waking up and saying some of the right things under new CEO Toshihiro Mibe. The other Japanese manufacturers also have much lower ambitions for future EV production than their European and even American counterparts, with the possible exception of Nissan.

日本的商业文化确实相当保守,所以改变来得很慢,尤其是这种改变是由外部激发的情况下。作为日本第二大汽车公司,本田在这方面也没有比丰田好到哪儿去,但在新任首席执行官三部敏宏的领导下,该公司似乎正在觉醒,并发表了一些正确的言论。与欧洲甚至美国同行相比,其他日本制造商对未来电动汽车生产的雄心也要低得多,日产可能是个例外。
原创翻译:龙腾网 http://www.ltaaa.cn 转载请注明出处


It is important to shift transportation over to electric vehicles, as gas-powered cars emit a lot of carbon. Even in Japan, which is a country with excellent and widely-used train systems for public transportation, transport is still the second-largest-emitting sector of the economy. If Japan expects to reduce emissions by 80% by 2050, an all-HEV scenario would result in only a ~30% reduction in automotive emissions, whereas an all-BEV scenario would exceed Japan’s 80% goal.

交通运输转向电动汽车很重要,因为汽油动力汽车排放大量的碳。即使在日本这样拥有优秀且广泛使用的公共交通火车的国家,交通运输仍然是第二大排放来源。如果日本的目标是2050年减少80%的排放量,采用全混合动力汽车的排放量只能减少约30%,而全纯电动汽车的排放量将超过日本80%的目标。

So, it is clear that Japan is lagging behind its international counterparts in this realm.

因此,日本在这方面明显落后于国际同行。

How will this affect Japan?

这将如何影响日本?

Japan faces dire economic consequences without action

如果不采取行动,日本将面临可怕的经济后果

The report suggests that Japan’s current path and longtime resistance to EVs will result in significant harm to its economy. About half of domestically-produced Japanese vehicles are exported (or 82%, if including vehicles produced overseas by Japanese companies), and Japanese companies supply 13% of the world’s passenger vehicles. That number could be slashed significantly if world markets lose their taste for Japanese gas guzzlers while everyone else transitions to EVs

报告认为,日本目前的发展道路和对电动汽车的长期抵制将对经济造成重大损害。日本国内生产的汽车约有一半用于出口(如果包括日本公司在海外生产的汽车,出口比例达到了82%),日本公司供应的乘用车占全球的13%。如果世界市场对日本的油老虎失去兴趣,而其他人都转向电动汽车,这个数字可能会大幅削减

Given the large chunk of Japan that is employed in automotive-related industries, this could result in a mass loss of jobs for the country. About 8% of the Japanese workforce, or over 5 million workers, are employed in automotive-related industries. The report suggests that Japan would lose 1.7 million jobs in automotive-related industries as domestic vehicles produced for export are cut in half.

考虑到日本很大一部分人受雇于汽车相关行业,这可能会导致该国大量失业。约8%的日本劳动力,也就是超过500万工人受雇于汽车相关行业。该报告显示,如果日本用于出口的国产汽车产品减半,汽车相关行业将失去170万个工作岗位。

The shift to EVs would not come without a reorganization of current workers – with some work being lost in automotive parts supply, for example – but it also presents opportunities for new jobs, such as charger installation or battery supply for domestic and international manufacturing.

转向电动汽车离不开现有工人的重组——例如,汽车零部件供应方面的一些工作将会减少——但这也带来了新的就业机会,比如为国内和国际制造业安装充电器或供应电池。

The situation is likened to Japan’s former dominance of the semiconductor and home appliance industries, which flourished decades ago. In both industries, Japan occupied a dominant position but became overconfident and did not respond rapidly enough to changes, allowing competitors in China, Taiwan, South Korea, the United States and elsewhere to take market share. As a result, while Japan still exports plenty of electronics, its economy has become more reliant on the automotive sector to bring money in.

这种情况与日本几十年前在半导体和家电行业的繁荣时期类似。在这两个行业,日本都占据主导地位,但过于自信,对变化的反应不够迅速,让中国大陆、台湾、韩国、美国和其他地方的竞争对手抢占了市场份额。因此,尽管日本仍出口大量电子产品,但其经济已更加依赖汽车行业来吸引资金。

How Japan can move forward
It’s not all doom-and-gloom, though. The report notes that Japan does have a significant lead on electrification-related patents, though these are largely associated with hybrid technology rather than BEVs.

日本该如何前进?
不过,也不全是厄运与低迷。报告指出,日本在电气化相关专利方面确实处于显著领先地位,尽管这些专利主要与混合动力技术有关,而不是纯电动汽车。

It also makes several policy proposals going forward for Japan. It suggests that the Japanese government move quickly to take these steps:

报告还为日本提出了若干政策建议。建议日本政府迅速采取以下措施:

Invest heavily in battery development, an area which Japan already has experience through Panasonic’s supplying of Tesla with batteries. This includes funding research into next-generation battery and semiconductor technologies.

大力投资电池开发,日本通过松下向特斯拉供应电池,获得了这一领域的经验。其中包括资助下一代电池和半导体技术的研究。
原创翻译:龙腾网 http://www.ltaaa.cn 转载请注明出处


Reduce or eliminate subsidies for consumer fuel cell vehicles, which Japanese companies have heretofore supported. FCEVs will likely not be relevant in consumer applications but may find use in heavy-duty applications or other niches, and research should be supported in those niches, rather than consumer vehicles.

减少或取消日本公司迄今为止一直支持的消费级燃料电池汽车补贴。燃料电池电动车可能与消费类应用无关,但可能会在重型应用或其他细分市场中使用,并且应该支持这些细分市场的研究,而不是消费类汽车。

Craft policy toward scrapping inefficient ICE vehicles and subsidizing low-priced BEVs. Further, consider stricter regulations on vehicles that don’t meet zero-emission criteria.

制定报废低效内燃机汽车和补贴低价纯电动汽车的政策。此外,考虑对不符合零排放标准的车辆实施更严格的监管。

Design “right to charge” laws to support home charging in condos and apartments, where many Japanese live.
Install fast charging at highway service areas to allow longer distance travel in BEVs.
Develop distributed grid power and vehicle-to-grid technologies.

设计“充电权”法律,支持在独栋产权公寓和公共公寓(许多日本人居住的地方)进行家庭充电。
在高速公路服务区安装快速充电,允许电动汽车行驶更远的距离。
发展分布式电网和车网技术。