According to the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) annual Emissions Gap Report 2019, further reductions in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are needed to reduce climate change impacts. In Japan, the 2030 Intended Nationally Determined Contribution (INDC) target is an emissions reduction of 26% compared to 2013. The World Health Organization (WHO) declared that the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak has led to 43,341,451 confirmed cases and 1,157,509 confirmed deaths globally and affected 218 countries (as of 27 October 2020). In Japan, as of the same date, 96,948 infectious cases and 1724 deaths related to the new coronavirus had been recorded. These numbers continue to increase. In Japan, in March 2020, the number of international tourist arrivals decreased by about 93% compared to last year at the same period. The World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) reported several significant scenarios for the tourism industry. COVID-19 is the greatest shock to international tourism since 1950 and represents an abrupt end to the 10-year period of sustained growth that followed the 2009 financial crisis. It was thought that it would be possible to analyze the economic, environmental, and social impacts of rapid social changes. Thus, this study estimates changes in Japan’s tourist consumption, the carbon footprint (CFP), and employment due to the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic. The calculations in this study adopt a lifecycle approach using input–output tables. Based on these observations, this study uses four scenarios (SR 1, no recovery until December; SR 2, recovery from October; SR 3, recovery from July or September; and SR 0, same growth rate as 2018–2019) for Japan to calculate the CFP and employment change using input–output table analysis based on tourist consumption, which is a tourism metric. According to our results (2019 vs. SR 1 and 3), the consumption loss is between 20,540 billion yen (−65.1%) and 12,704 billion yen (−39.1%), the CFP reduction is between 89,488 Mt-CO2eq (−64.2%) and 54,030 Mt-CO2eq (−37.5%), and the employment loss is between 2,677,000 people (−64.2%) and 1,678,000 people (−37.5%). As of November 2020, the tourism industry continues to be affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. In the post-COVID-19 society, it will be necessary to maintain the GHG emissions reductions achieved in this short period and realize economic recovery. This recovery must also be sustainable for tourism stakeholders and society.

The external costs derived from the environmental impacts of electricity generation can be significant and should not be underrated, as their consideration can be useful to establish a ranking between different electricity generation sources to inform decision-makers. The aim of this research is to transparently evaluate the recent external cost of electricity generation in G20 countries using a global life-cycle impact-assessment (LCIA) method: life cycle impact assessment method based on endpoint modeling (LIME3). The weighting factors developed in the LIME3 method for each G20 country enable one to convert the different environmental impacts (not only climate change and air pollution) resulting from the emissions and resources consumption during the full lifecycle of electricity generation—from resource extraction to electricity generation—into a monetary value. Moreover, in LIME3, not only the weighting factors are developed for each G20 country but also all the impact categories. Using this method, it was possible to determine accurately which resources or emission had an environmental impact in each country. This study shows that the countries relying heavily on coal, such as India (0.172 $/kWh) or Indonesia (0.135 $/kWh) have the highest external costs inside the G20, with air pollution and climate accounting together for more than 80% of the costs. In these two countries, the ratio of the external cost/market price was the highest in the G20, at 2.3 and 1.7, respectively. On the other hand, countries with a higher reliance on renewable energies, such as Canada (0.008 $/kWh) or Brazil (0.012 $/kWh) have lower induced costs. When comparing with the market price, it has to be noted also that for instance Canada is able to generate cheap electricity with a low-external cost. For most of the other G20 countries, this cost was estimated at between about 0.020$ and 0.040 $/kWh. By estimating the external cost of each electricity generation technology available in each G20 country, this study also highlighted that sometimes the external cost of the electricity generated from one specific technology can be significant even when using renewables due to resource scarcity—for example, the 0.068 $/kWh of electricity generated from hydropower in India. This information, missing from most previous studies, should not be omitted by decision makers when considering which type of electricity generation source to prioritize.

The importance of the contribution of tourism to climate change has been noted by the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO). By combining a process-based life cycle assessment (LCA) and input–output analysis, several researchers have attempted to evaluate the impacts of the tourism industry, as well as its products and services. Indeed, the tourism sector has a wide range of industries, including travel and tours, transportation, accommodation, food and beverage, amusement, souvenirs, etc. However, the existing cases do not show a breakdown of the impact on climate change. In this paper, the carbon footprint (CFP) of the Japanese tourism industry was calculated based on tourist consumption, using the Japanese input–output table and the Japanese tourism industry. We demonstrate that the total emissions were approximately 136 million t-CO2 per year. The contribution ratio of each stage is as follows: Transport 56.3%, Souvenirs 23.2%, Petrol (direct emissions) 16.9%, Accommodation 9.8%, Food and Beverage 7.5%, and Activities 3.0%. Then, in the breakdown, the impacts are in the following order: Air transport 24.7%, Petrol (direct emissions) 16.9%, Accommodation 9.8%, Food and Beverage 7.5%, Petrol 6.1%, Textile products 5.3%, Food items 4.9%, Confectionery 4.8%, Rail transport 3.9%, Cosmetics 1.9%, and Footwear 1.8%. In addition to transportation, this research also highlights the contribution from souvenirs, accommodation, and food and beverages.

The business event sector expects large economic impact as MICE (Meeting (M), Incentive Travel (I), Convention (C), and Exhibition and Event (E)). Some guidelines for MICE sustainability include the requirement for carbon management (carbon neutral, measurement of greenhouse gas emissions, carbon offset, etc.) as a positive contribution to mitigating climate change. According to the environmental guidelines for events updated by the Japanese Ministry of the Environment in 2019, goods should be procured after considering the environmental load items and life cycle stages from the life cycle assessment (LCA) perspective. In this study, we evaluated the business events sector, not only transportation but also accommodation of participants from overseas, as well as food and beverages, souvenirs and shopping, and entertainment and tourism expenses. These items were not included in the previous existing case studies. We evaluated the carbon footprint (CFP), calculated from consumption information using input-output analysis. In this study, the total CFP was 804.8 t-CO2eq (M, I, C-ICCA (Convention based on an international conference standard from the International Congress and Convention Association (ICCA)), and E) and transportation (Transp, 56.0%) contributed the most, followed by planning and preparation (Plan, 13.2%) and accommodation (Acc, 12.0%), souvenirs, shopping, entertainment and sightseeing (SE, 10.1%), and food and beverages (FB, 7.9%). In the case of M, I, C-JNTO (Convention based on an international conference standard from the Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO)) and E, the total CFP was 1714.4 t-CO2eq and transportation (Transp, 54.3%) contributed the most, followed by planning and preparation (Plan, 14.3%) and accommodation (Acc, 12.9%), food and beverages (FB, 9.2%), and souvenirs, shopping, entertainment and sightseeing (SE, 8.2%). From this result, the CFP of this sector was found to be due to transportation, planning and preparation, accommodation, food and beverages, and souvenirs. Sustainability guidelines recommend that organizers procure products that contribute to lower CFP, and it is considered good practice to provide participants with such product and service choices. The providers themselves also need action to offer low CFP products. Assessing changes in consumption items in future studies may help to calculate environmental impacts and sustainability.

In order to achieve target greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, such as those proposed by each country by nationally determined contributions (NDCs), GHG emission projections are receiving attention around the world. Generally, integrated assessment models (IAMs) are used to estimate future GHG emissions considering both economic structure and final energy consumption. However, these models usually do not consider the entire supply chain, because of differences in the aims of application. In contrast, life cycle assessment (LCA) considers the entire supply chain but does not cover future environmental impacts. Therefore, this study aims to evaluate the national carbon footprint projection in Japan based on life cycle thinking and IAMs, using the advantages of each. A future input–output table was developed using the Asia-Pacific integrated model (AIM)/computable general equilibrium (CGE) model (Japan) developed by the National Institute for Environmental Studies (NIES). In this study, we collected the fundamental data using LCA databases and estimated future GHG emissions based on production-based and consumption-based approaches considering supply chains among industrial sectors. We targeted fiscal year (FY) 2030 because the Japanese government set a goal for GHG emissions in 2030 in its NDC report. Accordingly, we set three scenarios: FY2005 (business as usual (BAU)), FY2030 (BAU), and FY2030 (NDC). As a result, the carbon footprint (CFP) in FY2030 will be approximately 1097 megatons of carbon dioxide equivalent (MtCO₂eq), which is 28.5% lower than in FY2005. The main driver of this reduction is a shift in energy use, such as the introduction of renewable energy. According to the results, the CFP from the consumption side, fuel combustion in the use stage, transport and postal services, and electricity influence the total CFP, while results of the production side showed the CFP of the energy and material sectors, such as iron and steel and transport, will have an impact on the total CFP. Moreover, carbon productivity will gradually increase and FY2030 (NDC) carbon productivity will be higher than the other two cases.