A Japanese megabank is tapping into what may be the country's first solar panel farm located in a sheep pasture for renewable energy to power buildings housing the bank's domestic branches As part of its efforts to reduce carbon emissions MUFG Bank has signed a contract with Osaka Gas Co for the bank to receive electricity generated from an 89-hectare pasture in the coastal town of Shiranuka in Hokkaido The farm is expected to produce about 19 gigawatt-hours annually enough to power about 4,000 Japanese households a year a local power generation business based in Hyogo Prefecture says the "solar grazing" setup offers mutual benefits to sheep and the solar panels The sheep are likely to keep running costs down by eating weeds while the shade under solar panels lets them escape the sun and graze more Osaka Gas will buy the entire generated supply and distribute it to MUFG Bank for 20 years as electricity with a "nonfossil certificate" confirming it is from a renewable source MUFG Bank is set to use it to power branches located in rented properties to cut its annual greenhouse gas emissions by around 20 percent The company has already switched its own buildings' energy supplies to renewable sources While initiatives to grow crops such as potatoes under solar panels have increased in recent years Machiokoshi Energy says the pasture-based combination is likely to be a first for Japan but it's easy to go into the red when reopening farms," said Shoji Numata "By combining livestock business with solar power generation it's possible to more than double the income," he added Japan aligning with U.S., Europe over offshore wind amid China fears To have the latest news and stories delivered to your inbox Simply enter your email address below and an email will be sent through which to complete your subscription Please check your inbox for a confirmation email Thank you for reaching out to us.We will get back to you as soon as possible The Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications reported that in fiscal 2021 the total revenue of Japan’s furusato nōzei system increased by 23% year-on-year to a record breaking ¥830.2 billion The number of donations also reached a new high It is thought that the steady demand from at-home “nesting” consumption during the COVID-19 pandemic has contributed to this increase Furusato nōzei is a tax donation system launched in 2008 to correct the imbalanced tax revenue between urban and rural areas Taxpayers can get income and resident tax deductions up to the total amount donated by making donations to a municipality of their choice They also get gifts in return from the municipality The system has gradually become popular as an efficient way to pay tax and shop the total amount of donations stayed at around ¥10 billion in fiscal 2015 there was a rapid increase in donations due to revisions made to the system including raising the maximum limit of deductions and simplifying the declaration procedure Since it generated revenue of ¥8.1 billion in its first year the scale of the system has expanded more than 100-fold which mainly reciprocates with scallops and crab received the highest amount of donations with ¥15.3 billion was the second highest followed by two further municipalities in Hokkaidō: Nemuro which gives return goods like sea urchin and crab Municipalities that include luxury seafood and brand-name meat in their lineup of return gifts now regularly receive some of the highest donations and the original purpose of the system to let people who had moved to cities for education or work contribute to their hometown economies has been lost The reverse side to this is that the tax revenue loss after deductions for people who have donated rose to a record high of ¥567.2 billion in fiscal 2021 This equated to 7.4 million people eligible for tax deductions The city with the largest loss was Yokohama with ¥23 billion followed by the similarly large urban regions of Nagoya Some municipalities feeling the strain of this tax revenue loss are calling for a reform of the system Created by Nippon.com based on data from the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications Kazuo Nakagawa confesses to still being haunted by his wartime past along with a photograph of his wartime self TOKYO – A 101-year-old man who participated in the Battle of Leyte Gulf — a key event in Japan’s World War II defeat — has spoken publicly for the first time about his experiences in hopes of raising awareness about the futility of war in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine Kazuo Nakagawa survived the 1944 Philippines-based ocean conflict in which the Imperial Japanese Navy was effectively nullified by U.S has rarely spoken of his wartime experiences — even to his family upon seeing young men fighting on the front lines following Russia’s invasion of its smaller neighbor he felt compelled to recall his own wartime experiences Nakagawa recently delivered a war-themed lecture in his hometown using emotive words and dramatic gestures to evoke his past hit the ship and exploded with a boom,” he said the then 22-year-old Nakagawa was serving aboard the heavy cruiser Takao when it departed Brunei for the Leyte Gulf — where U.S landing forces were amassing — along with the Yamato and Musashi battleships he was once assigned to search for underwater mines in the dark Nakagawa spotted a fast-moving surface wave about 600 meters to the right of his vessel The missile hit the central part of the ship’s hull causing a huge column of water to rise up and rain down upon the vessel’s personnel When another underwater projectile hit the ship’s stern the 200-meter-long vessel tilted sharply to the right “We’re all going down,” Nakagawa remembers thinking Courtesy of Yamato MuseumHeavy cruiser Takao there was a prevailing belief that it was natural to die for the nation and Nakagawa says he was determined to shout “Tennoheika banzai!” (Long live the emperor!) when his time came The battle claimed the lives of 33 of Nakagawa’s shipmates and wounded many more Nakagawa recalls a colleague who suffered burns all over his body crying out: “I’m in so much pain; let me die!” Nakagawa and his fellows fanned him down in attempt to ease his pain The Takao was later taken to Singapore for repairs and the war ended while Nakagawa was there Nakagawa returned to his hometown and became a dairy cattle farmer He had four children and is now a great-grandfather he confesses to still being haunted by his wartime past I thought I wasn’t afraid to die,” he recounts the Japanese fleet poured its energies into holding off the U.S forces that were gradually closing in on Japan from the south was a crew member on the heavy cruiser Myoko which was sailing about 4 kilometers from Nakagawa’s ship running up the stairs to escape a deluge of seawater after a torpedo hit close to his post in the generator room “If the torpedo had hit 3 meters further back Yoshii looked across the water and saw the Musashi engulfed in flames making it impossible for other vessels to approach Yoshii remembers watching the demise of the ship and thinking he has gradually started to open up about his experiences off the coast of the Philippines he delivered his first public talk on the issue “I’ll continue sharing my experiences in the hope that people will realize that war should be avoided at all costs,” he said The Yomiuri ShimbunToshio Yoshii talks about his experience with a model of heavy cruiser Myoko in his hands in Yokohama on July 19 This page may not operate normally when these functions are not supported by your browser or the setting is disabled.​ Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions CorporationIwatani Corporation Japan—Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions Corporation (Toshiba ESS) announced that they have started a demonstration project in partnership with Iwatani Corporation (Iwatani) in Kushiro city Hokkaido Prefecture at a hydrogen production facility using hydrogen produced from a small hydropower plant for establishing a hydrogen utilization model suitable for the local characteristics of Hokkaido This project is proceeding as a result of a proposal submitted to the Ministry of the Environment Japan under the Ministry’s “Low-Carbon Hydrogen Supply Chain Demonstration Project.” The opening ceremony for the project was held today in Hokkaido Toshiba ESS has constructed a small hydropower plant at the Shoro Dam in Shiranuka town on Hokkaido’s Pacific coast Electricity from the dam will be used to electrolyze water and separate hydrogen at the hydrogen production facility made by Toshiba ESS which produces about 35Nm3 of hydrogen every hour The hydrogen will be transported by Iwatani to generate electricity with Toshiba ESS’s pure hydrogen fuel cell systems which were installed at dairy farms and indoor swimming pools in Shiranuka and use as fuel for fuel cell-powered vehicles at Toyota Motor Corporation’s Shibetsu proving ground “I’m excited that Toshiba will contribute to providing more comprehensive hydrogen solutions encompassing all processes from the production to utilization of hydrogen in Hokkaido,” said Hiroyuki Ota General Manager of the New Energy Solutions Project Team at Toshiba ESS “As a leader in developing integrated systems for using hydrogen I’m sure that our environmentally friendly hydrogen solutions will contribute to a low-carbon future.” General Manager of Hydrogen Gas department at Iwatani said “We will play an important role in expanding the use of hydrogen energy based on our technology to transport and our know-how on the construction and operation of hydrogen stations.” For furthermore information about Our Hydrogen Energy business, please check here. including product prices and specifications content of services and contact information is current on the date of the news release but is subject to change without prior notice SORTING SALMON: Salmon are sorted after being unloaded at a port in Shiranuka Fish catches in Japanese waters have plunged in recent years – the catch volume hit a record low in 2020 for the second consecutive year and has dropped to about 30% of the peak in the 1980s Massive deaths of sea urchins and salmon have been reported off Hokkaido and a government panel of experts has suggested dismal catches could continue due to global warming and other factors a 38-year-old fixed-net fisherman who catches autumn salmon more than half of the fish caught in my net are already dead," said Kimura According to the Hokkaido prefectural government a massive red tide – a type of harmful algal bloom – that occurred off the Pacific coast from September caused the deaths of about 27,700 salmon and about 2,700 tons of sea urchin The red tide had caused about 8 billion yen in damages as of Nov Kimura's salmon catch has plunged to one-fifth the level 15 years ago and he has been operating at a loss for the past few years "The number of salmon swimming upstream to spawn will drop so I think this could affect future catches," Kimura said A red tide commonly occurs in warmer waters the Hokkaido outbreak involved toxic plankton found in Japan for the first time that can survive even in the nation's cooler waters "We never expected this could happen," said Makoto Hatakeyama at the Hokkaido Research Organization's Fisheries Research Department the total volume of fish caught in Japan in 2020 excluding those raised through aquaculture declined by about 2.2% from the previous year to about 3.15 million tons This volume has been constantly dropping since peaking at about 11.5 million tons in 1984 Catches of three highly popular kinds of fish have also fallen Fishermen netted about 220,000 tons of Pacific saury in 2011 but this plummeted to about 30,000 tons in 2020 the catch of Japanese flying squid dropped by 80% over this period and varieties of salmon by about 60% Several causes have been suggested for this sharp decline One leading theory is rising sea temperatures caused by global warming while changes in ocean currents also have been cited an expert panel at the Fisheries Agency pointed out the possibility that fish found off Japan's coast have moved offshore to waters where the temperature remains colder and that the population of fish that prey on young fish has increased The panel also raised concern that the poor catches could continue around the nation for an extended period A joint research project by the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology and Hokkaido University found that marine heatwaves – a phenomenon in which the sea surface temperature stays high – occurred every summer off the coast of Hokkaido and the Tohoku region from 2010 to 2016 According to the Japan Meteorological Agency in July the sea surface temperature in the northern Sea of Japan and off southeastern Hokkaido was about 2 C to 4 C higher than normal years "It can be assumed that a marine heatwave also occurred this summer," said Toru Miyama "The marine environment is changing dramatically." Fish originally found in warm waters are now being caught in seas around northern Japan Catches of yellowtail – a fish that had been caught relatively rarely in Hokkaido – have surged around the prefecture about 10,873 tons of yellowtail were netted an about 16-fold increase from the volume caught in 2004 This fish is now being sold as a local specialty Catches of pufferfish and lobster have soared off Fukushima Prefecture so moves to brand these as local delicacies are under consideration saury fishermen and others from Iwate Prefecture have been trialing a sardine fishing operation Saury fishing grounds are now found farther from Japan and catching the fish in coastal waters has become much more difficult Changes in ocean currents have been suggested as one cause of this sardine hauls have been positive overall: 4,889 tons were caught in the trial's first year "This won't fully cover the loss in income suffered by saury fishermen but it will help them balance their budgets," said an official at fisheries promotion section of the Iwate prefectural government the global production volume through aquaculture and now accounts for more than half of the fishing industry's entire production volume fish raised in land-based facilities are gaining considerable attention as an option that would not be affected by changes in the marine environment has been cultivating mackerel in the town of Iwami This process uses naturally filtered underground seawater which leaves the fish less susceptible to parasites and allows the soft roe to be eaten raw Even prefectures without a coastline are tapping this industry Pacific white shrimp is being raised in Yamanashi Prefecture and Saitama Prefecture is home to a facility cultivating mackerel Nara Prefecture – which is known for its clear water – has been cultivating pufferfish in a building of a defunct school The first shipment of the fish is scheduled for this winter Poll results are published every Monday in The Guam Daily Post University of Guam students and faculty are leveraging international academic conferences to foster economic innovation and workforce development positioning the island as a hub for what School of Business and Public Administration Dean Roseann Jones Saturday’s Mad Collab Block Party in Hagåtña brought together more than 70 local businesses and artists in celebration with hundreds of attendees It was all about the wonders of Artificial Intelligence in the palm of your hand All of the latest features in Samsung's Galaxy AI were showcased at a GTA-sponsored event Thursday Your browser is out of date and potentially vulnerable to security risks.We recommend switching to one of the following browsers: