Kushiro Coal Mine is located in southeast of Kushiro-City, Hokkaido, Japan and the only underground as well as under seabed coal mine. Paleogene Harutori Coal Bearing Formation is mined over the long period. During the mining, associated methane gas called as Coal Mine Methane (CMM) is extracted for safety reasons. In addition, another type of methane from the Cretaceous is also extracted, and mixed with CMM. Taking these factors into consideration, Kushiro Coal Mine has researched and studied for the development of gas collection technique and effective utilization system. As part of the investigation, Kushiro Coal Mine and Osaka Gas have promoted the effective utilization by gas concentration technique using Pressure Swing Adsorption, and the whole system has operated in 2017. The purpose of this article is to review general design of the gas concentration project of Kushiro Coal Mine.

Gallium is used as a raw material for a CIGS solar cell. In the manufacturing process of CIGS solar cells, only 30% of the target material is used, and the rest is not used and becomes a spent target scrap. In order to recover gallium from spent target scrap, we investigated the process composed of hydrometallurgical treatment only which does not require pyrometallurgical treatment. We describe the details of the developed process in this report.

An Advanced Graduate Program in Global Strategy for Green Asia (GA) is a component project of the "Program for Leading Graduate Schools" which is supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) and started in 2013. The concept of a “Green Asia” is a bold ideal. Some of the most challenging global environmental conditions now exist in Asia. Many developing countries face the difficult task of raising millions of citizens from poverty. Consequently, environmental concerns are often overlooked. The key to this complex issue is scientific innovation and a transfer of knowledge from technologically advanced to less advanced nations. This educational program aims to cultivate leaders in science and technology who are able to contribute to the realization of an Asia where ecology and economic growth can coexist. Only 20 exceptional students including 10 Japanese and 10 international are allowed to enroll in the GA program each year. This elite group are taught in a bespoke educational environment, also benefitting from the vast collective resources and shared facilities of KU. The students are offered a financial support in order attract the premium candidates and to maximize the available study time by avoiding the need for part time jobs. The students of the Green Asia Education Program follow a stage gate system. This system comprises of six stages, Research Laboratory Rotation, Practice School, Coursework, International Seminar, Internship and the Green Asia Seminar. All activities described above are carried out in English in order to educate international and multicultural sense. Through these program, the students acquire five abilities, which are research, global perspective, leadership, practice and system landscape. In addition, applied skills such as expansion, analysis and upstream thinking skill are also trained by various activities, especially, practice school and international internship. As first batch students had finished this program in March 2017, we introduce the GA program and how the program is managed and carried out in order to make this program better.