'Green Heat' Certificate System Being Developed in Hokkaido

The Hokkaido Bureau of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI Hokkaido) in Japan established a committee on June 12, 2008, to develop a "green heat" certificate system for facilities that use snow-and-ice cryogenic energy. This move follows Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry in starting to investigate the introduction of a "green heat" certificate system in order to develop and promote the industry in this field. METI Hokkaido is already well acquainted with the technical side of using snow-and-ice cryogenic energy, and it has the best track record in Japan so far with introducing facilities that employ this type of energy. The committee is in the process of implementing a survey on the operational status of existing facilities, designing a certificate system for renewable thermal energy, and conducting demonstration tests of the system.

The first demonstration project was conducted by the committee, which itself took the responsibility of examining qualifications for certification. The green thermal energy generator selected for the project was Yukigura Kobo, a zero-temperature facility used to store rice grains, owned by Bibai City Agricultural Cooperatives in Hokkaido. The user of the value of the green thermal energy was Sapporo Dome Co., a company that hosts sports games in its dome facility in Sapporo, Hokkaido, which allocated the green thermal energy for that used for air-conditioning the dome.

At the Yukigura Kobo facility, the biggest of its kind in Japan, cool and cold air from the snow storage house is circulated inside the building in order to utilize snow-and-ice cryogenic energy for storage of unpolished rice. Through this demonstration project, the committee intended to determine the optimum method for measuring green thermal energy, the proper cost of trading it, and the definition of green thermal energy most attractive to purchasers.

- 'Snow Cooling System' Gaining Popularity in Hokkaido (Related JFS article)
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Posted: 2009/01/11 06:00:15 AM