[in Japanese]

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[in Japanese]

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At present, 1.2 million new houses are built in Japan per year, and existing houses number 54 million. The importance of renovating existing houses is growing in light of the advent of an aging society with a declining birth rate, and a call for realizing a sustainable society. This paper describes the current situation in which the qualitative improvement of the existing stock of housing through renovation is demanded by the Basic Act for Housing enacted in June 2006. It also introduces recent trends in house renovation.

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As a measures to prevent global warming, it has become urgently necessary to reduce domestic energy consumption. However, the amount of energy used in everyday life has been increasing, and the types of energy have been diversifying, with the improvement of living standard and the diversification of lifestyle. Consequently, increasingly complex measures are being introduced to reduce energy consumption or provide alternative energy. This paper outlines the present status of domestic energy consumption, focusing on the role households are to play in preventing global warming; suggestion of new methods for energy saving in a house; and methods of providing alternative energy sources for household use.

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The committee of revised proposal of residential lighting standard started in July, 2004. This paper reports the outline of final draft to be revised proposal of residential lighting standard: JIEC-005 (1994) made by the committee. The revised proposal of residential lighting standard is consisted to two parts. The first part deals with the lighting criteria of residential lighting and second part deals with the procedures of lighting design and operation systems for the various areas.

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Generally, the replacement of housing luminaires is recommended when they have become 10 to 20 years old. On the supposition that a household has 10 luminaires on average, the number of luminaires in need of replacement is estimated at more than 100 million. Since luminaires are regarded as durables, most more than 10 year-old luminaires are not replaced as long as they can be lit somehow. It is necessary to establish a clear standard on the service life of luminaires, and thereby make general consumers more conscious of the need to replace them.

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Ensuring there is sufficient natural light is an essential part of housing design. However, renovation sometimes results in a house receiving less natural light. In particular, the adding of extra load-bearing walls for earthquake proofing may adversely affect the amount of light a house receives. On the other hand, some buildings have been renovated to improve their lighting. This paper presents some proposals to improve lighting by solving some dilemmas, and introduces the advantages of some of our company original technologies.

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In our country, the shift of an existing house to the reform is seen from the newly-built starting constructing fullfilling the number of houses of the house. However, the housing improvement is more various than that of building the residence person's aging, the lifestyle, and the change in the life stage, etc. - the main needs for construction. Reform engineer's abundant knowledge is demanded.

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When renovating house lighting, people want to have one more convenient and more suitable to their individual tastes than the one they have now. Manufacturers are actively developing new lighting fixtures that are friendly to the aged, helpful in natural disasters and crime prevention, and also sophisticated as interior decoration. To meet consumer demands, efforts are necessary to give information on said products to users and also ensure that the products will be bought and used correctly.

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