IEEJ：August ©IEEJ 2022
Special Bulletin
A Japanese Perspective on the International Energy Landscape (596)August 4, 2022

Participating in 43rd IAEE Tokyo International Conference
Ken Koyama, PhD
Chief Economist, Managing Director
The Institute of Energy Economics, Japan
From July 31 through August 4, the International Association for Energy Economics (IAEE)
held its 43rd annual International Conference at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies(GRIPS) in Tokyo. The IAEE is an international academic society functioning as a platform to analyze
and consider energy and environmental issues from the main viewpoint of economy and others
including politics, geopolitics, technology and society. Its annual International Conferences have been
held at various sites in the world, including Tokyo for the latest one cosponsored by the Institute ofEnergy Economics, Japan, and GRIPS.
The 41st IAEE International Conference took place in Groningen, the Netherlands, in 2018
and the 42nd one in Montreal, Canada. The IAEE failed to hold the annual meeting in 2020 due to theCOVID-19 pandemic. In 2021, it convened an online International Conference for the first time. The
latest one was the first face-to-face meeting in three years, taking the form of a hybrid conference
combining direct participation with online participation. Since July, Japan including Tokyo has faced
the seventh wave of COVID-19 infections that has featured a rapid increase in the daily number ofnew infections. However, the conference was implemented safely on schedule. The number ofparticipants in the conference surpassed 600 on a registration basis, including more than 400 direct
participants. More than half of the direct participants came from abroad. The 43rd IAEE International
Conference was the second held in Tokyo, following the first one in 1986, where I had an opportunity
to take part in a large international conference in the second month after my entry into the IEEJ. I felt
a surge of emotion at the first IAEE conference in Tokyo in 36 years.
The general theme for the Tokyo meeting was “Mapping the Energy Future: Voyage inUncharted Territory.” As noted in the opening plenary session on August 1, the phrase “Voyage inUncharted Territory” fits the current international situation that features chaos and great uncertainties.
In such situation, participants vividly discussed how to depict the future picture of energy. Theconference comprised the opening and closing plenary sessions, eight dual plenary sessions, four
round table meetings and 75 concurrent sessions. At these gatherings, presentations and question-andanswer discussions were conducted under various themes.
Undoubtedly, one of the key focuses at the conference was global decarbonization towards
the goal of carbon neutrality as an important challenge regarding global energy and environmental
issues. Participants discussed energy policies and measures for carbon neutrality, as well as relevant
problems and solutions. The trend to enhance decarbonization initiatives has globally accelerated since2020 and remained a global important challenge. The trend will remain a great power to transform thefuture picture of energy in the world over the long term. Therefore, it was natural for the trend to attract
high interest at the conference.
However, symbolizing the phrase “Voyage in Uncharted Territory” among IAEE conference
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participants were the outbreak and escalation of the Ukraine crisis since Russia’s invasion into Ukraine,
the subsequent global comeback to the issue of energy security and growing interests in energy
geopolitics and global energy governance. For me, having participated in numerous international
meetings including the IAEE International Conferences, the Tokyo conference was an opportunity tofeel dramatic changes in a global energy forum by understanding that energy security and geopolitics
have been emphasized as an important matter of interest to such extent. In this sense, I would like tosummarize key points of the discussions mainly at the Dual Plenary 1 session that I moderated under
the theme “Energy Geopolitics: Challenges and Opportunities for Asia.”
First, I felt that how to get energy as an indispensable good stably at affordable prices has
become a central energy issue and a global challenge due to global energy price hikes, energy market
destabilization and insecurity about future Russian energy supply. Energy security has become a toppriority challenge in developed countries including European countries that depends heavily on
Russian energy supply, the United States where energy price hikes affect approval ratings for thecurrent administration and Japan plagued with concern about a tighter electricity supply-demandbalance in the coming winter. Importantly, however, it was pointed out in the conference that Asianand other developing and emerging countries have been hardest hit by the energy price hikes.
Stabilizing international energy markets amounts not only to ensuring national energy security but also
to stabilizing and developing the world. We should be conscious of the significance of initiatives forenergy market stabilization as a matter of global interest as well as national interest.
Second, discussions at the conference led me to feel that international energy markets now
face destabilization that is likely to deteriorate or escalate further. Energy security generally focuseson security of supply in energy-consuming countries. While this is natural, security of demand is an
unignorable issue for energy-producing countries. If the trend to enhance energy security in energyconsuming countries is combined with the decarbonization trend to reduce demand for fossil fuels,
resource-rich and energy-producing countries’ economic, political and social stability will be affected.
The stability of fossil fuel markets will remain important in the course of energy transition over thelong term. The issue of how to stabilize the Middle East, though hidden behind the Ukraine crisis, willcontinue to hold the key to international energy market stability. However, the division of theinternational community and the subsequent energy market chaos are even more serious, as clarified
by the Ukraine crisis. As the Western bloc advocating values such as freedom and democracy isconfronting China and Russia, other countries are involved in the confrontation in a manner to indicate
a global structural rivalry or confrontation. In such world, energy has become a strategic good and apolitical weapon. As the Ukraine crisis is expected to be prolonged with no end in sight, theinternational energy situation is assumed to have no choice but to further continue a “voyage inuncharted territory.” Energy strategies and policies must be based on the assumption.
Third, I would like to note that I felt the need for seriously considering how to reconstructglobal energy governance for the long term even in the face of a dark, severe future picture of theworld, what each country and entity should do for the reconstruction and how to develop internationalarchitecture for the reconstruction. On the occasion of the first oil crisis in 1973, cooperation between
then Western oil-consuming countries collapsed once in the face of the Arab oil embargo. TheInternational Energy Agency was then created to rebuild the cooperation. Since then, countries in theworld have prioritized international cooperation through the IEA and other organizations while
promoting national energy security. This international system has been shaken by the Ukraine crisis.
Toward the coming winter, Europe, expected to face serious gas shortages depending on future
developments, and Japan, shaken by the Russian Sakhalin 2 issue, may be forced to wage a zero-sum
game to acquire additional gas supply sources. Major countries may be required to reaffirm the2

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importance of maintaining global energy governance and develop some framework or international
initiative to enhance, share and cooperate in market stabilization efforts.

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