The objective of the present study is to reveal the influences of domestic communication on energy conservation behavior in daily life. The Ministry of the Environment, Japan implemented the“ Uchi-Eco-Shindan”Project in 2011, which provides households with environmental consulting services. In the present study, questionnaire surveys including questions about the situation of domestic communication (e.g. whether they talk about home-appliance replacement for energy conservation with their family members after “Uchi-EcoShindan”) are conducted with 613 households that were provided with “Uchi-Eco-Shindan.” The available data (254 out of 613 households) is analyzed using statistical methods. The analysis finds the possibility that households’electricity consumption after “Uchi-Eco-Shindan” is influenced by the two types of domestic communication, that is, to talk about replacement of appliances to reduce electricity consumption and to warn each other about energy conservation behavior. The present study suggests that domestic communication promotes energy conservation behavior in daily life, and concludes that more detailed analysis is necessary in the future.

This article discusses possible hurdles foreseen by a large-scale introduction of intermittent renewable energies (described as “RE” hereafter) from wind and photo-voltaic (the latter “PV” hereafter) powers. The analysis was carried out using actual recent load, wind and PV data of 15 min resolutions of Kyushu Electric Power Co. The results indicate the following three conclusions: (1) the surplus energy and grid power would become large once the proportion of the annually produced energy by RE would become above 40 % of the total annual electric load, (2) CO₂ emission from back-up systems due to thermal power stations burning fossil fuels did not go down much even by a large amount of RE introduction, and (3) in order to ameliorate this situation and for RE to be implemented of its full potential, an increase of the present pumped storage capacity of Kyushu Electric Power Co. by more than a few tens of times is necessary.