Japanese companies, and the Japanese government, are also keen to receive U.S. oil and gas exports. They see these supplies as important to reducing Japan’s trade surplus with the United States and as major contributions to global energy security—as Japan imports 99 percent of its oil and 98 percent of its natural gas. Prior to the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident, nuclear power provided 30 percent of Japan’s electricity. By 2020, not much more than 5 percent of the country’s electricity came from nuclear. LNG, already significant for electric generation, filled much of the void—in 2020
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