Benchmark Study on Green Buildings - Royal Architectural Institute ...

initiatives proposed include acceleration of the Biomass Town Program and the
promotion of biomass energy in Asian countries.
Also in 2006, Minamata City of Kumamoto Prefecture in southern Japan announced its
plans to attain a high rate of biomass resource utilization in the city. Aiming to become a
“Biomass Town,” the city plans to use more than 92 percent of waste biomass and more
than 40 percent of unused biomass, focusing on the utilization of wood biomass and
livestock waste. The city has been collecting household waste sorted by citizens into 21
categories since 1993, composting all food waste, and has achieved a 20 percent
reduction in waste volume. According to the announcement, the city plans to start
biomass power generation in fiscal 2006-07, and livestock waste treatment in fiscal 2009.
Since Minamata City’s announcement, MAFF has added biomass utilization plans by
three more municipalities -- Shikaoi Town in Hokkaido, Maniwa City in Okayama
Prefecture and Yusuhara Town in Kochi Prefecture -- to its Biomass Information
Headquarters website. This website had been set up to provide a variety of information
relating to the Biomass Nippon Strategy, Japan’s strategy for biomass utilization. Since
2004, MAFF has been inviting municipalities to submit plans for promoting
comprehensive and effective use of biomass based on this program. Shikaoi Town aims
to produce and efficiently apply high-quality compost derived from waste biomass,
establish systematized technologies to utilize biomass by using biogas energy, foster
collaboration between farming and stockbreeding operations, and create a sustainable
community with fewer impacts on the natural environment. Maniwa City seeks to
organize a system for collecting, transforming and using waste biomass derived from
wood processing, livestock manure, food waste and unmarketable lumber products. The
city aims to raise its waste biomass utilization rate to 90 percent or more. Yusuhara Town
plans to effectively use its rich wood biomass resources and establish a cyclical use
system for waste biomass such as kitchen garbage, human wastes and agricultural
effluent sludge. This brings the number of Japanese “Biomass Towns” to 39.
METI Eco Town Program:
The Eco Town Program is another METI initiative whose objective is to promote local
economic stimulation through fostering environmental businesses that utilize the
strengths of local industries, and to create resource-recycling socio-economic systems by
promoting local approaches for recycling and suppressing the generation of waste. Local
governments play a central role in activities under this program, by linking local citizens
and industries in order to achieve innovative approaches to urban development that are
environmentally friendly and do not duplicate existing frameworks. More specifically, a
local government first creates an “Eco Town Plan” that takes advantage of the region's
local characteristics. Then, if the basic concepts and concrete projects written into the
plan are judged by METI and the Ministry of the Environment as meeting a certain
standard of originality and innovativeness, and judged to have the potential to serve as a
model for other local governments, the two ministries jointly approve the plan. They then
provide financial support for projects by local governments and private organizations to
improve physical recycling facilities, and to implement “soft”
(institutional/organizational) projects that can contribute to the realization of a recycling-
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