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

oriented society. Currently Japan has 24 Eco Towns, with the first being Iida City in 1997
and the most recent being Osaka in 2005.
Friends of the Earth (FoE) Japan:
Friends of the Earth (FoE) Japan is an international environmental non-governmental
organization (NGO), and has been working since 2004 to encourage local governments
nationwide to join the FoE “Fifty-Fifty” Program, in which public schools can receive
half of the money they save through reducing electricity, fuel and water costs. More than
2,000 public schools in Germany have already started with this program. Students,
teachers and school facility managers work hand in hand to promote energy efficiency -
without making any new investments in energy-saving equipment or installations - and
local governments partially reimburse schools for these reduced energy costs. In 2004,
FoE Japan compiled a how-to manual for this program as a model CO 2 emission control
project that involves community cooperation and promotes energy saving activities in
schools, resulting in reduced public expenditure. Between September 2004 and January
2005, six public schools in Suginami Ward, Tokyo, participated in the program as a
model project, and achieved a 0.77 percent reduction of CO 2 , or a decrease of 1,880
kilograms compared to average emissions over the same time period during the previous
three years. Encouraged by these results, a total of 62 elementary and junior high schools
in Suginami started this program starting with the second semester of 2005. As in the
previous year, the ward office distributed posters encouraging energy saving to all the
schools. The school children work to save energy, reviewing the use of energy and water
in schools on their own initiative, using an “Eco-audit” manual. Other than these
examples in Suginami, five elementary and junior high schools in Oita City, Oita
Prefecture started this program in 2005 as a pilot project. The local government is
supposed to refund to schools half the amounts they save and appropriate from its
Environmental Section budget a sum equal to another one-fourth of the savings, for tree
planting and school yard greening.
B-5 Australia:
Australian Government’s climate change strategy:
The Australian Government’s climate change strategy is centered on five key areas –
emissions management; international engagement; strategic policy support; impacts and
adaptation; and science and measurement. The strategy also recognizes that society is
more likely to embrace climate change countermeasures if there are support programs
and incentives available to help them, as the costs of becoming more sustainable can be
quite high. A division of the Australian Department of the Environment and Heritage, the
Australian Greenhouse Office (AGO), delivers numerous programs under the Australian
Government’s $1.8 billion climate change strategy.
Australian Climate Change Science Program (ACCSP):
The Australian Climate Change Science Program (ACCSP) aims to improve our
understanding of the causes, nature, timing and consequences of climate change so that
industry, community and government decisions can be better informed. The program is
conducted in partnership with leading science agencies, notably the Commonwealth
Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), the Bureau of Meteorology and
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