Light Behind the Fall: Japan’s Electricity Consumption, the
Environment, and Economic Growth By Vaclav Smil The phenomenon
is unmistakable (albeit largely unnoticed), and the contrast
lends itself to all kinds of symbolic interpretations: Japan’s
unending retreat from being a highly respected polity and
economic powerhouse, widely expected to become the 21st
century’s global ichiban, has entered troubled waters. As a
result of that downward economic trend, whose beginning was
signaled by the collapse of the Nikkei index in 1990, Japan’s
GDP managed the real (inflation-adjusted) annual growth of just
1.1% between 1991 and 2006, while during the preceding 15 years
the country’s GDP had nearly doubled.  But this long-lasting
economic and social malaise has been accompanied by a
substantial (17%) increase in Japan’s primary energy
consumption. This is remarkable because pre-1990 Japan was the
world’s most consistently, and most admirably, energy-efficient
economy that had always managed to do with relatively less