About
Nagareyama is a residential city with high level culture and rich natural environment, located northwest part of Chiba Prefecture next to the Metropolis of Tokyo, and Edo River is running in the western border and Tone Canal is running in the north part of the City. It has a population of 162 361 as of April 1st, 2010; the number has been increasing so far and also still estimated to be increasing in the next decade.
In August 2005, Tsukuba Express Railroad (TX) started its operation and it takes only 20 minutes from the city to the downtown of Tokyo. TX and the development along the railroad brings with it the opening of attractive shopping centers, other commercial facilities and new residents, in particular in the Nagareyama-Otatanomori area. The city is in the process of development.
On the other hand, city government puts priority on environment protection. The people in Nagareyama call their city “the rich green city nearest to the Tokyo Metropolis” as a specific image of the city, because of the existence of lots of natural forests. The city government started giving “Green Chain Certification” to good development acts from April 2006 so as to conserve and create rich green in the city area. “Green Chain Strategy”, is a very unique policy by the city government in Japan.
City government recommends putting appropriate greens when constructing any building, so that people enjoy nature and avoid heat island phenomena. After this green chain certification, the buyers can now be provided loans from banks with discounted interest rate.
The symbolic animal of the City is a goshawk, which lives in Ichinoya Forest Park located in the central part of the city. The name of the TX station, Otatanomori means “the forest of a goshawk” and a variety of ecosystem and rich natural environment are conserved in this Otatanomori, “the forest of a goshawk” and comfortable residents’ area and toll apartments have been developed near the forest. Therefore, people living in this area can fully enjoy the beautiful nature and environment as well as the convenience of the urbanized city.
Strategy
The city government prepared “Promotion Plan of the Measures to Cope with Global Warming (Nagareyama Plan for Stop Global Warming)” in March 2006 and has been implementing some measures according to the plan. However, the amount of emission of GHG in 2007 was 716 000 tons and showed 22 per cent increase compared with 588 000 tons, the amount in 1990. This increasing rate largely exceeds that of the whole country.
The population of the City has continued to increase since 1990, due to urbanization as one of the bed towns of Tokyo and changed to show a more rapid increase especially after 2005, when TX started its operation and also the City Government started development around the stations. An estimate of the city population showed that population will still continue to increase and will reach 181 000 in 2020, an increase of about 20 000 people as compared with the present. In addition, commercial facilities and private companies will also come to these areas. Therefore, emission of CO2 will also increase greatly.These characteristics of the city should be taken into consideration in preparation of future action plans concerning reduction of CO2 emission.
In March 2010, the city government prepared and published two kinds of action plans concerning global warming after a succession of discussions in the Environment Council of the of Nagareyama City and public comments procedure. The first one was “Nagareyama Action Plan of the Measures to Cope with Global Warming (all of City area edition)” and the second one was “Nagareyama Action Plan of the Measures to Cope with Global Warming (City operation edition)”.
The city government has decided that the short-term and mid-term targets of CO2 emission are as follows on the base of a report of the above Environment Council.
- 9 per cent below 2007 by 2012
- 20 per cent below 2007 by 2020
The amount of CO2 emission in the city has been constantly increasing from 1990, the target year of the Kyoto Protocol. The amount of CO2 emission in the city in 2007 was estimated to be approximately 710 000 tons, a 22 per cent increased from 1990. Taking a look by sections, emission from office activity section has increased by 76 per cent from that of 1990, and emission from household section has also increased by 64 per cent from that of 1990. In 2007, as 46 per cent of total amount of CO2 emission were from these two sections, and it will still continue to increase due to the development along the TX, it is very important for the city to reduce CO2 emission from these two sections as well as the transportation section.
Implementation of the Action Plans
To achieve the short-term and mid-term target of CO2 emission, the city government decided on six priority projects (“the Projects”) in the Action Plan. The brief description of the Projects is as follows.
1. An environmental household account book
As first opportunity to tackle with global warming issue, the city government will try to spread environmental household account books to the citizens in order to understand the actual situation of CO2 emission in each household and to achieve new life styles with low carbon emissions.
2. Introduction of environmental management systems in the offices
The city government will guide all of the offices to introduce environmental management systems in order to reduce negative environmental impact by activity of offices and factories.
3. Promotion of renewable energy
The city government will promote a low carbon society by the introduction of renewable energy such as photovoltaic generation.
4. Innovation of transportation in the City
The city government will promote the use of public transportation and bicycle including electric bicycle by citizens instead of the use of automobiles.
5. Efforts toward the sound material-cycle society
The city government will take measures towards the sound material-cycle society through the reduction and recycling of domestic waste and office waste.
6. Increase of carbon dioxide sink
The city government will take measures to promote urban greening and green chain strategy in order to formulate green rich city and to increase carbon dioxide sink.