TOKYO -- Japan is preparing to allow offshore wind farms beyond its territorial waters in its much larger exclusive economic zone, with a more involved approval process that will require companies to secure consent from local interests such as fishing operations before they build.
The proposed change would open up as much as 10 times as large an area for wind projects. Japan's territorial waters -- the area up to 12 nautical miles from the coast -- span 430,000 sq. kilometers, according to the Japan Coast Guard. This plus the exclusive economic zone, which extends 200 nautical miles beyond that border, encompass about 4.47 million sq. km -- the sixth-largest such area in the world.
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