Outlook for a nuclear-free Japan brightens

Japan has extracted natural “ice gas” from methane hydrates beneath the sea off its coasts in a technological coup, opening up a super-resource that could meet the country’s gas needs for the next century and radically change the world’s energy outlook. The state-owned oil and gas company JOGMEC said an exploration ship had successfully drilled 1,000ft below the seabed into deposits of methane hydrate, an ice-like solid that stores gas molecules but requires great skill to extract safely.

Box Inc., the Web-storage provider with more than 140,000 business customers, is planning to hold its initial public offering in 2014, Chief Executive Officer Aaron Levie said yesterday in an interview.