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JFS Newsletter No.189 (May 2018)
Image by Ponta.
The Seikatsu Club Consumers' Co-operative Union (Seikatsu Club) is a joint association of 32 co-ops throughout Japan. Based on the idea that consumers themselves should purchase the food they need to live, the club has been making collective purchases for more than 50 years through affiliations with trusted producers across Japan. Its efforts to purchase secure and safe products are now expanding to businesses that respond to various social challenges, including building livable communities and energy problems.
JFS Newsletter No. 179 (July 2017)
Seikatsu Club: Japanese Cooperative Managed by Members' Will to Confront Social Problems
https://www.japanfs.org/en/news/archives/news_id035882.html
Electricity and energy are as indispensable to our lives as food. However, unfortunately it is difficult to be energy self-sufficient within our own local living environment. To tackle this challenge, the Seikatsu Club is building region-to-region relationships related to energy, using its 50 years of experience linking producers and consumers.
Aiming to supply and sell its own electricity rather than leaving it up to the national government or power companies, several Seikatsu Club co-ops invested funds to establish the Seikatsu Club Energy Co. in 2014. It purchases electricity from 46 renewable energy power stations in Japan to sell mostly renewable energy to approximately 10,000 households and businesses nationwide.
This issue of the JFS Newsletter introduces the "Yumekaze" Seikatsu Club Wind Turbine built in Nikaho City, Akita Prefecture (northern Japan), focusing mainly on how it connects urban areas and the countryside, as well as production and consumption. This project was the starting point of the Seikatsu Club's activities in the energy sector. ("Yumekaze" literally means "dream wind.")
Image by Billy Lindblom. Some Roghts Reserved.
The Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC) reported on March 7, 2018, that the average summer temperature in land areas of the Arctic has increased approximately 2 degrees Celsius in the past 15 years, suggesting that summer warming has been progressing in the Arctic along with drying of the soil.
A research group of the Institute of Arctic Climate and Environment Research (IACE) of JAMSTEC conducted a statistical analysis of satellite observation data and land-surface reanalysis data. These data were collected for 15 years from 2002 to 2016 in the Arctic tundra region (about 5,530,000 square kilometers), which accounts for about 80% of land in the Arctic region. For the first time in the world, JAMSTEC showed that the average summer temperature (June to August) in the Arctic tundra region had increased about 2 degrees Celsius, notwithstanding a lack of signs of this warming in the mean annual temperature.
JAMSTEC also revealed that evapotranspiration has been increasing in the region as global warming has progressed. It analyzed data on the amount of the water retention on land after taking out the amount of evaporation and outflow to rivers, etc. The results showed that in the past 15 years, approximately 110 billion tons of water have evaporated from the region, equivalent to a water depth of 2 centimeters.
Summer warming may accelerate the melting of permafrost, leading to emissions of greenhouse gasses that were previously locked in the earth and, consequently, accelerating global warming. JAMSTEC expects the findings of its study to contribute to the investigation of the climate change issues on a global scale including global warming. It plans to conduct a more detailed analysis of global warming mechanisms in the Arctic region and evaluate their impact on wetlands, lakes, and vegetation.
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