Purpose of this research is to clear present condition of restrictions of acceptance on business-related wastes and effective policies in local government. Methods of this research are questionnaire survey to local government and panel data analysis. Findings of this research are as follows:
 1. Policies which have high implementation rate and less differences in city size are, inspection carried without the use of inspection equipment, and measures against the contamination of waste from other cities.
 2. Policies in which business-related wastes reduction effect are recognized are, measures against the contamination of waste from other cities, inspection carried with the use of inspection equipment, obligation of reservation for carrying to self-carry, price increase of business-related waste fee, restrictions of acceptance on recycling possible wastes, and inspection carried without the use of inspection equipment. This is the order of the policy of high effect.

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 At present, the Japanese municipal solid waste management system largely relies on incineration. Mainly the combustible waste is incinerated, the incombustible waste is landfilled. However, the amount and composition of combustible waste has been changed in recent years by implementation recycling, and the ratio of kitchen waste in combustible waste has been higher, leading to a trend of lower heating of combustible waste and the current deficiency of poor heat recovery in incineration. In addition, the organic loading to final disposal sites from organic matters in the incombustible waste is a serious problem. Considering Kitahiroshima city as the case study area, this study attempts to improve the property of combustible waste and loading of the final disposal site with mechanical-biological treatment (MBT), and evaluated the feasibility of MBT in Kitahiroshima city. As a result, this study showed that MBT could improve the property of the combustible waste and the loading of final disposal site. Meanwhile, the financial cost of MBT scenario is lower than that of regional incineration. Therefore, Kitahiroshima city has potential to introduce MBT.

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 The Great East Japan Earthquake generated a huge amount of disaster waste along coastal municipalities especially in Iwate and Miyagi Prefecture. To investigate the reason for the revisions of the estimated amount of disaster wastes, we referred to the disaster waste management plan of these prefectures, to characterize changes of the amount in each prefecture. In addition, we applied regression analysis where we adopted damage level indicators, such as flooded land area, as explanatory variables. As a result, we found a correlation between flooded built-up area and amount of disaster waste, and the basic unit of disaster waste in flooded land area was 34.2 thousand ton per 1 square kilometer. Using waste flow data in the disaster waste management plan of Miyagi prefecture, we made material flow analysis between before and after intermediate treatment, and investigated the relationship between the amount and composition of waste generation and throughput. The amount of waste generation is estimated at tentative stockyard where there are a lot of mixed wastes, while throughput is estimated where wastes are ready for final disposal or recycling. As a result, the ratio of combustible and non-combustible differs before and after the treatment.

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 Efficiency improvement of the resources circulation and energy system is essential for developing sustainable region and city. For this purpose, it is necessary to construct a system that can supply resources and energy with impact on the environment as less as possible while reducing the consumption of resources and energy in each district that make up the region. In addition, the possibility of reconstructing the industrial structure and spatial structure of cities and regions also should be considered to suit for energy and resource recycling system from a long-term point of view. Therefore, it is necessary to combine the appropriate policies with the regional characteristics considering wide variety of related measures. Based on the above viewpoint, in this study, an evaluation model is developed based on the consideration of each policy effect. And a new approach is proposed to design a resource and energy circulation system in accordance with the regional characteristics from a long term perspective.

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 This study conducted a case study in Atsubetsu area of Sapporp city to investigate improvement of financial and CO₂ conditions for a present district heating and cooling system (DHCS) considering increase in heating energy demand capacity and utilization of rice straw as unused biomass. Making it obligatory for new or existing buildings to participate in the DHCS improved financial conditions. Utilization of rice straw led to more spending than natural gas because collection and transportation costs for rice straw are expensive although the DHCS secured financial profit more than it already is. CO₂ credit and subsidy for piping systems can cover a part of the cost increased by the utilization of rice straw. Furthermore, future reduction in heat charging might be big incentive for participants to a DHCS.

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 Forestry is one of the key industries in Wakayama Prefecture and its promotion is an important issue for the prefectural government. In addition, wood resources are carbon-neutral and are therefore useful in preventing global warming. The use of unused thinning for energy production has been applied in many places as measure for both forestry promotion and global warming prevention. In this case study, the reduction in GHG and the economic effect of powder fuel made from unused thinning wood are examined in the area of Hidakagawa Town, central Wakayama. Most wood materials produced by thinning of 25-year-old trees are abandoned at the thinning sites in Wakayama. This study is aimed at the utilization of these abandoned wood materials. A field survey was done to get basic data for the evaluation of the performance of the powder fuel, and an input-output table for Hidakagawa Town was developed for economic analysis. As a result, the potential GHG reduction, economic effect, and job creation by the introduction of the wood power fuel were estimated to be about 550 t-CO2/years, 62 million yen/year, and 3 employees, respectively.

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 In recent years various environmental programs have been conducted to address climate change. However, CO₂ emission reduction derived from people's behavioral change has rarely been quantitatively-analyzed after programs. In this paper, the community-level energy/environment learning approach and the formulation for metric evaluation were proposed so that household CO₂ reduction as a whole in a community/region can be estimated by accumulating CO₂ emission reduction in a family after energy/environmental learning program has conducted. To estimate, various programs which target individuals from kids to adults were assumed and ranked. Level of cooperation of other household membership, decrease of households continuing saving energy by time, and overestimation caused by participation of other household membership in a different program were also considered. According to a case study in Bunkyo City, Tokyo, in most actions, α of A level program was about 0.2 larger than that of D level. Through programs, α was 0.3 and β was 0.6 approximately on average.

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 There are policy measures available to increase floor-to-area ratios applicable to urban development which offer public open spaces. The expansion of the measures is under consideration in order to take into account their environmental actions and improve carbon emission efficiencies. However, it is not easy to ensure continuity of low carbon energy uses in the developed areas, because the measures just enhance the planning and constructiton of low carbon building. In this study, we assumed a new scheme to increase floor-to-area ratios for development zones which have a goal of zero carbon emission by energy conservation and energy creation, and commit to the use of renewable energy for the remaining portions supplied to the area from the electrical grid. In an case study, it was calculated that the additional expenses incurred from the purchase of renewable energy were equivalent to approximately 10% of the incremental rent generated by the increase in the floor area ratio. It is revealed that the policy measures are applicable to the cartain areas of high rent, and that it supports the various voluntary and continuing initiatives to improve carbon emission efficiencies in the developed areas.

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 To resolve global environmental issues, people must review their lifestyles and take action. This study assessed an improved method to calculate the balance of environmental productivity and consumption capacity based on an ecological footprint (EF), which is used as a tool to measure the environmental load generated directly by a person's daily life activities. Moreover, scenario analyses of several villages in Tsukuba city have been proposed to discuss management methods for environmental improvement. Based on scenario analyses, this study conducted sensibility analyses of the potential of environmental improvement. Results showed that: 1) promotion of solar panels is an effective means to improve the environmental balance in villages with a high rate of detached residences; 2) returning land to forestry or farming shows high efficiency in villages with much unused land; and 3) ameliorating the quality of public transportation is useful in villages that are distant from the city center.

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 In order to achieve a sustainable society, it is important to grasp the Material Stock (MS) in use by society. Because of lack of statistical data, a new way to estimate MS is needed. In this paper, an estimation model that uses Nighttime-Light data and Synthetic Aperture Radar data is presented. This model was used to calculate the total building floor area in Aichi, Gifu, Mie, and Shizuoka Prefectures. It provides a division between urban and non-urban land use. The results show that in the case of urban land use, linear and non-linear modeling offer high estimation accuracy of ±10%. However, only linear modeling was accurate for non-urban land use. These accuracy levels are confident enough to be used for other regions or other countries in future research.

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 In order to maintain the lives of people in the region, adequate maintenance of the infrastructure such as patrol and inspection is needed. However, while the staffs and their time for the maintenance are reducing, the interest is not sufficiently directed to the social risks and costs incurred by the reduction. In this study, we develop the method for evaluating the social costs under the personnel constraint by dynamic programming. In addition, sensitivity analysis is conducted to show how the risk will change if the size of the residential areas is analyzed.

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 Understanding appropriate geometric configuration is required when pool-and-weir fishway with high migration rate is set up. Almost its bottom slope is horizontal on existing them and the past study. However, there is no study for effect of the bottom slope in pool-and-weir fishway on migration rate. In this study, effect of bottom slope in pool-and-weir fishway on migration rate of ayu (Plecoglossus Altivelis Altivelis) by changing flow velocity and bottom slope was investigated. It was found that the migration rate become high value when the bottom slope was set low toward downstream side wall to upstream one. It is because migration route is short in this bottom slope.

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 A numerical simulation model was developed to describe material cycling and river ecosystem in river channel network, which includes the backwater effects of weirs on flow, thermal environments and material cycle. The model was applied to the Ibogawa-river basin in Hyogo, Japan. The results of the numerical simulation show that the effect of a weir is accumulated and expands in longitudinal direction while passing through a number of weirs. The increased residence time in the reservoir of weir enhances the deposition and decomposition of particulate organic matter.

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 In Japan, cultivated land abandonment has been increasing rapidly in recent years and it causes degradation of biodiversity and decreases ecosystem services from agro ecosystem. Thus, it is required to determine the factors increasing cultivation abandonment and predict the future level of abandonment in regional scale in order to design strategy towards sustainable agriculture system under region-specific context. From this viewpoint, we tried to develop factor analysis and prediction model of abandonment cultivated land of Japan in reagional scale. We used census of agriculture and forestry distributed by Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries of Japan. And to identify the structure of the cultivation abandonment from the census data, we employed three machine learning algorithms, General Linear Model (GLM), Multivariate Adaptive Regression Spline and Random Forests (RF). The result shows that the best machine learning algorithm to predict the cultivation abandonment in Japan was RF algorism and it could detect major factors under reginal specific stituations.

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 Edible wild mushrooms and plants have long been harvested in rural communities. As most of these non-timber forest products are self-consumed, few valuation studies have been conducted. This study investigated current condition and trend of the harvesting activities qualitatively through in-depth interview at Natauchi District of Nanao City, Ishikawa Prefecture and tried to estimate the economic and cultural values. Provisioning services were valuated using the market price of major harvested products. We found that harvesting these products provides large economic value for each household. For cultural services, both the harvesting activities and harvested products have significant social value to transfer traditional food culture and knowledge including experience and techniques required both for harvesting and processing through catalyzing communication in and out of the community.

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 In this study, the authors conducted a hearing survey to comprehend the activities and challenges of 24 areas that have been participating in the project named “paddy fields for the cradle of fish” in Shiga Prefecture, and classified those areas based on local features obtained in the survey. As a result, the 24 areas were classified into three major groups: Type I) most of them are located in Kohoku or Koto-Region, giving priority to ensuring rice yeild rather than value adding, shipping cultivated rice to Japan Agriculture (JA) mainly, and being with relatively weak activities; Type II) most of them located in Kosei-Region, giving priority to value adding than ensuring the yeild, selling rice through their own marketing route, and being with weak activities; and Type III) all of them located in Konan or Higashi-Ohmi-Region, shipping rice to JA mainly, and being with strong activities. In addition, with these features of respective groups, some feasible measures to increase the area of project fields could be contrived.

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 The water quality of Isahaya Reservoir was calculated with a numerical model, which mainly consists of organisms such as phytoplankton, zooplankton, benthos and fish, and inorganic nutrients such as nitro-gen and phosphorus. As a result, it was considered that the removal of planktons from the reservoir contributes effectively to the improvement of water quality because nutrients transition from water to the organisms was estimated at high level, while it remains problems on initial/ running costs and throughput for the purification equipments. On the other hand, the nutrient transition to benthos and fish was estimated at low level. Therefore, the removal of benthos and fish should not be adopted. Since the most of nutrient loads into the reservoirwere derived from thebasin, and were taken into planktons and were used forthe primary production causing organic pollution of reservoir, the bypass of loads from basin was expected to avoid extra organic pollutant. The effectiveness in 50 % nitrogen load bypass was estimated at 37 % reduction of nitrogen budget in the reservoir. And as the release and resuspension of nutrients from sediment were not negligible, the 50 % reduction of suspension by sand capping on the sediments might deserve 17 % reduction of nitrogen budget.

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 With poor laver harvest in 2000, the environmental problem in the Ariake Sea became social issue in Japan. Though the environmental impact assessment of the operation of water gates of this reservoir was conducted suspended solids (SS) were not included in the environmental impact assessment. Therefore, necessary information especially settlement and coagulation-flocculation related with the seawater inflow from the Ariake Sea is inadequate for the prediction of SS in the reservoir. The aims of this research are to analyze the behavior of SS under the salinity at same level of seawater and to predict the accumulation of sediment in the reservoir according to the inflow of seawater. The prediction of SS is done using parameters of settlement and resuspension obtained from model calibration during the trial opening of water gates in 2002. It is found that SS in the reservoir will become lower according to dilution by the inflow from the Ariake Sea and coagulation-flocculation under high level of salinity. Sensitivity analysis indicates that sediment will accumulate in the reservoir after the inflow of seawater.

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 We investigated the effects of sedimentary and flowing FPOM (Fine Particulate Organic Matter) at the up and downstream sites of Kase dam in Saga Prefecture before and after initial impoundment. We present main clear evidence that the nitrogen isotope ratio in sedimentary FPOM at the St. 2 and St. 3 (2.2km and 11.7km downstream from the dam) in spring of afterfollowing impoundment were was significantly higher than those that of before impoundment. After impoundment of the Kase dam, phytoplankton was increased in the reservoir and they were supplied to downstream reaches of the dam. Our results suggest that qualitative changes of sedimentary FPOM downstream of a dam by after initial impoundment was is associated with the state condition of production growth of phytoplankton in the reservoir.

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 Act on promotion of recycling of small waste electrical and electronic equipment was in force on April 1, 2013 after an intense debate on its necessity or type of recycling system. Stakeholders' anxiety that they have to shoulder excessive burdens was actualized as the debates. The cost-effectiveness analyses played a big role to clinch the debates. The purpose of this paper is to reveal what kind of significances the cost-effectiveness analyses have as factor to justify the necessity of recycling implication and its system, and how the framework of the recycling system is influenced by the results of cost-effectiveness analyses. Suggestions that the benefit incidence table is used for the role-sharing of recycling system's stakeholders are also revealed.

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 To introduce the renewable energy in regional communities, it is necessary to select a sustainable energy mix with low environmental impact from the complex viewpoints. The purpose of this study is to develop a tool to optimize and evaluate renewable energy composition in municipalities considering multiple environmental criteria. This tool was developed by creating a database of energy demand and renewable energy supply potential of all municipalities in Japan and designing functions as evaluators. The developed tool successfully calculated optimal solutions in scenarios with different constraints and objective functions, and demonstrated a trade-off between ecosystem conservation and economic benefit.

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 This Study shows a feasibility of Japan's long-term mitigation target, reducing Greenhouse Gas emis-sion by 80% by 2050, considering a constraint of the key low carbon technologies diffusion. The results indicate that unavailability of CCS is crucial to achieve the long term reduction target. Notably, crude steel production process by blast furnace become one of the largest emitter without CCS. In contrast, phase-out of nuclear power and constraint of renewable energy have relatively less impact. However, if both of them are unavailable or constrained, carbon price to achieve the long term reduction target rises substantially. To examine a national climate policy, it is important to consider uncertainty of key low carbon technologies such as CCS and renewable energy as well as nuclear power.

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 A new sizing method for stand-alone PV systems was developed and applied to a fictitious village with a population of 50 individuals, to which electric power is supplied only through the PV system. As in the case of previously developed numerical methods, the electric power balance was calculated day by day, with variable daily irradiation. In this study, variable electric demands were also employed and fluctuated with a trend (sine curve) and normal distribution. Based on a factorial design, amounts of daily power generation and consumption were calculated for a 1 year period and repeated for 100 years, under several conditions of given PV panel and battery capacities. A sizing function of two variables (PV panel and battery capacities) was obtained using repeated calculation averages and response surface methodology. This procedure provides an analytical solution for cost optimization of PV systems. By following the procedure, we demonstrated cost optimization of PV systems under a design condition of only one day of power failure per year. The construction specifications and costs for 20 years operation were estimated to be 448 kWp of PV panel capacity and 683 kWh of battery capacity, and 439 million yen, respectively.

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 We conducted interviews to obtain Japanese experts' evaluations on four types of greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction measures targeting carbon-intensive industries. The measures were evaluated based on ten criteria, such as GHG emission reduction impacts and economic effectiveness on implementation. Using evaluations by 42 experts in Japan, we conducted a signed rank test and cluster analysis. For each measure, we then identified criteria characteristically evaluated by clusters of the experts. With those evaluation tendencies and expert opinions, we identified key issues to be considered when introducing emission reduction measures: appropriate implementation and coordination with stakeholders based on comparative merits for the upstream carbon tax; minimal complication and concrete methods for consumption-based GHG inventories; clear rules and appropriate levels and kinds of material to be targeted for certification; identification of countries and technologies that are not often chosen for CDM projects; and follow-up measures for the Joint Crediting Mechanism.

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 This study estimates global CO₂ emission reduction potential from iron and steel sector in 2050. As countermeasures for CO₂ emission reduction, installation of electric arc furnace is adopted. The constraint of installation is set up from the both supply side of iron scrap and demand side of goods-wise crude steel production. The crude steel production is estimated under two case; BaU case (No countermeasures) and CM case (With countermeasures).
 For all the estimation periods, crude steel production is greater than generation of iron scrap. This makes it impossible to substitute electric arc furnaces for all the basic oxygen furnaces. Even though 100% recycling rate of iron scrap, under BaU case, CO₂ emission in 2050 increases by 12% compared to that in 2005. With same condition, 32% of CO₂ emission reduction is achieved in CM case. With a constraint from demand side, the reduction potential is 6% (CM case.)

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 In this study, the authors developed a text mining technique to identify concerted or opposed relations among the committee members in public work planning processes with using the processes' minutes. As the result of applying the developed technique to the minutes of the Yodo River Watershed Committee, it was indicated that tendency of remarks on main and sub-themes would be a useful tool to classify the members by the subjects of remarks and position of each member on the “dam construction”, respectively. It was also possible to identify concerted or opposed relations between the Kinki Regional Development Bureau and some members as well as among the members by drawing a network graph with distance of the tendency of remarks on sub-themes and response relationships.

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 Resource productivity indicators have been increasingly adopted in Europe and Japan as a metric of sustainable development. The value of resource productivity differs widely between countries. We analyzed factors that differentiated resource productivity of Japan, Australia, and China, as well as factors that changed resource productivity of the three countries from 1995 through 2010. We draw the following coclusions. (1) The difference in resource productivities of Australia and China and that of Japan can be mostly explained by the difference in resource-use intensity of goods and services and difference in demand structure for exports. (2) The changes in national resource productivity during the target period were influenced by changes in resource-use intensity of goods and service. In addition, impact of demand structure for exports and impact of domestic final demand structure were also observed for Australia and China, respectively.

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 This study aimed to discuss the effect of collaboration between officers of local governments and citizens on the recognition and behaviour of the officers. Collaboration in the Yatsugatake Nanroku Scenic Byway was used as a case study. This collaborative activity has been promoting landscape conservation since 2006 in the northern area of Hokuto City, Yamanashi Prefecture. The partnership consists of several organizations of the citizen sector and three organizations of the governmental sector, namely, the national government, Yamanashi Prefecture, and Hokuto City. Three administrative officers from the prefecture and the city involved in the partnership were interviewed. According to the qualitative analysis of the narratives in the interviews, the process of the change in their recognition and behaviour proceeded as follows: (1) resolution of confrontational recognition regarding the partnership, (2) recognition of the benefits of the partnership, (3) positive contribution to the collaboration, and (4) application of information obtained through collaboration to governmental projects. The process showed a positive feedback loop in which positive evaluation of the experience in the collaboration reinforced the officers' motivation to participate. The elements in their positive evaluation included (1) sympathy for the citizens' view, (2) evaluation of the citizens' knowledge and experience, and (3) esteem for the citizens' voluntary attitudes. From the analysis, this study concluded that established and continuous collaboration with eager and knowledgeable citizens affected the recognition and behaviour of the of-ficers, which led to the reinforcement of the partnership and development of collaborative landscape conservation.

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 The increasing concerns in China's air pollution crisis and the energy structure adjustment has heightened the need for renewable energy. Meanwhile, Residential Grid-connected PV Power System(RGCPVS) as a popular application of PV power is just launched in China, which faces great opportunities and challenges. Thus, this study discussed this issue from five sections. Firstly, we built a SWOT matrix for the factors we assumed to be the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats to the development of RGCPVS in China. Next, we collected data from a survey towards Japanese and Chinese experts, and confirmed that the most significant S, W, O and T factors are ‘Economic benefit’, ‘Economic barriers’, ‘Government is getting values’ and ‘Lack of funds’, respectively. Then, through statistical analysis, we verified Japanese and Chinese experts share analogous views on 14 factors, while one of their most significant divergence is the evaluation for ‘Government is getting values’, we explained the reasons and built a policy intervention and green product lifecycle model to clarify it. Next, we revealed that experts with different backgrounds take a similar point of view for the vast majority of SWOT factors by using ANOVA method. Finally, our recommendations were presented.

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 This research proposes downsizing possibility evaluation technique for waterworks pipeline network in population decreasing society. Possible downsizing for pine location and time are extracted for district demands including future uncertainty based on hydraulic supply capacity. Uncertainty of district demands in the future is defined as probabilistic water distribution with standard deviation obtained by time series data of local water demand. Relation of district demands and hydraulic characteristics is modeled by Monte Carlo method and hydraulic network simulation. Probabilistic distribution of flowing quantity and effective hydraulic pressure after downsizing is estimated. Possibility of downsizing is judged on this hydraulic distribution. When the judgment result is shown in map, location and time of possible downsizing in water pipeline system are visually grasped.

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 Judging from the situation in developing countries, the water infrastructure market is likely to see future growth. At present, however, the provisioning of water lifelines is not keeping up with increasing demand from population growth and rapid industrial and commercial development. Moreover, due to the less than optimal pipeline layout and deterioration of existing water systems, they often suffer from problems such as leaks and inadequate pressure. In undertaking the upgrading of water pipelines in developing countries, a planning model is needed that can achieve efficient pipeline provisioning and renewal within budgetary limits.
 This study therefore focuses on pipeline upgrading plans in developing countries. It proposes an optimization model for selecting more appropriate pipe diameters and materials from the two standpoints. One is to satisfy the hydrological constraints of the water distribution network dealing with future water demand increases. The other is to reduce life cycle costs utilizing some part of existing pipes. The model is based on genetic algorithms (GA), and internalizes pipe network analysis. Applying the proposed model makes possible “selection and concentration” of the upgrading process, by eliminating pipelines with small investment benefit and giving priority to renewal of other pipelines, which gives us an efficient renewal plan with long-range.

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 The integrated and multi-functional pipeline system should require quality, quantity, and reliability in water supply. This paper describes how to redesign the drinking water distribution system including both self-cleaning function and disaster resilience. In this study, distribution network analyses in some Kobe City distribution areas were conducted in case of downsizing and redesigning of water distribution system, and self-cleaning function of pipeline was evaluated by the frequency of pipe flow velocity, because the pipe flow velocity more than 2.0 m/s could prevent degradation of water quality in pipelines such as the composure of suspended substance. Also, disaster resilience was evaluated by recovery resistance curves in water supply and opportunity loss in recovery period. As a result, a trade-off between self-cleaning function and disaster resilience was pointed out. It was shown that earthquake resistance should be reduced, while smaller diameter pipe should improve self-cleaning property due to increasing of pipe flow velocity in the distribution network system. In addition, it was indicated that blocking pipe network would contribute to earthquake-resistant improvement, but its network should make security of self-cleaning function of pipelines difficult. It was said that branch-formed pipe network might improve self-cleaning function, but could decrease earthquake resisting. Consequently, it was indicated that, under a condition not to replace with earthquake-resistant pipeline in restructuring water distribution network system, a redesigning water distribution system would ensure both self-cleaning function and earthquake resilience in its networking system.

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 Mortality risk due to water pollution is one of serious problems especially for Asian developing countries. The timing to carry out a policy or project against such a problem is typical debate issue. In our precedent research, with survey data sets in Vietnam and Laos asking citizens' willingness to pay for mortality risk reduction, we found a robust relationship between their age and WTP (=Option Price) in both of theoretical and econometric perspectives. In this study, we also derive Option Value, namely a non-use value of the hypothetical water service. For a reason that there is a number of insolvent people to pay the fee in developing countries, we propose an alternative benefit index which is combined with Option Price and Option Value properly. Finally, regarding this measurement and comparing with the countries those had sufficient water and sewage system sufficiently, we examine the relationship between Environmental Kuznets Curve Hypothesis and our analytical results.

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 Noise barriers are installed on highway entrance ramps etc. of roads by overlapping them to control noise leaking from barrier openings. The overlaps should be designed to be as short as possible while providing the required noise blocking capability. This paper proposes the LBE-11 method: a method of calculating the noise levels L_A,LB in the vicinity of overlapped noise barriers. LBE-11 considers the fact that noise increases by being transmitted directly, reflected, and diffracted from the opening of the overlap and the fact that noise is greatly dampened as it is transmitted from above the overlapped part of a noise barrier. These modes of transmission are calculated by substituting the transmission of sound through the four openings. And it was confirmed that the LBE-11 method has precision sufficient for practical use by performing an evaluation based on a 1/25 scale model experiment. Furthermore, trial calculations of linear sound sources of traffic noise to study simplification of the calculation to optimize the overlap length had been performed. The results clarified that even if the noise transmitted above the location where the sound barrier is overlapped is considered to be noise transmitted above a single wall, the design of the overlap length is adequate, but reflected noise and diffracted noise at the opening of the overlap must be considered.

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 This study aimed to verify whether the identification of individual mammals using fecal DNA could be used to assess the environmental impacts of a road. We selected the Japanese hare, Lepus brachyurus, as target species for the DNA analysis. A total of 36 hares (28 males and 8 females) were identified from 344 fecal samples, and 4hares of them has crossed both sides of the road. I suggested that the individual identification method by fecal DNA would be applicable to difficult-to-capture mammals, herbivorous mammals and more sedentary mammals around the road.

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 For sustainable society, it is important to realize food supply and demand system which is low environmental load. Previous studies about the system focused on only an aspect, for example lifestyle, economy or environmental aspect. In this study we aimed at both environmental load and lifestyle.
 Firstly, we analyzed material flow on food supply-demand system by input output table. Then we estimated amount of food consumption, food loss, energy input to production of food and carbon dioxide emissions. As the result, this study found that approximately 50 million [t-CO₂] carbon dioxide emissions in 2009. This is accounting for 4.5% of the total carbon dioxide emissions in Japan.
 In the next, we investigated possibility of the food supply-demand system which reduce environmental load and meet the quantity of nutritive substances which need to intake each day. To estimate we used linear programming whose limiting condition were quantity of nutritive substances and objective function were minimization of environmental load. As the result, environmental load was minimized when the intake of Cereals, Potatoes, Beans, Meat and Dairy products increased, while Vegetables, Fruits and Seafood reduced. When all Japanese people realize this diet system, the reduction of carbon dioxide must be 5 million [t-CO₂] per year in approximately.

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 Satoyama is a term applied to dynamic mosaics of socio-ecological production landscapes maintained through long-term human management, where people support each other to enhance their use of natural resources and play an important role in sustaining biodiversity. Such landscapes are often characterized by bartering or sharing provisioning services such as various forest and agricultural products within and beyond their communities. The objective of this study is to quantitatively investigate how such sharing mechanisms work and how they contribute to human well-being in Japan. We conducted web-questionnaire survey and found that people share diverse agricultural products grown in their own farmlands and the amount of such products with non-market transaction was significantly higher in Noto Peninsula than other regions. The result suggested that self-production and sharing network substantially contribute to human wellbeing by enriching food species diversity and social relation. However, urbanization and globalization in recent decades have weakened such personal connections and sharing mechanisms. Balancing market and non-market transaction of food provisioning services across different scales would be one of the key challenges to build localized models of sustainable society in harmony with nature.

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 There are technical, economic, and social aspects to the utilization of agricultural residues for energy production, though these are important from the viewpoint of global warming. In addition, the stable supply of agricultural residues in Japan might be difficult in the future because agriculture here employs few young workers, with the proportion of old actually having increased in recent times. In this study, we therefore develop a model to estimate the production of agricultural residues taking into account the population and composition of agricultural workers. This model was applied to Hyogo prefecture as a case study, and the outlook for the production of agricultural residues in the period from fiscal year ending March 2011 (FY2010) to fiscal year ending March 2031 (FY2030) was estimated. It was found that agriculture workforce will reduced from 150 thousand in FY2010 to 63 thousand in FY2030. Accordingly, the production of agricultural residues will decline from 7.8 million tonnes to 3.8 million tonnes. Further, if the proportion of workers aged 14-44 were to be raised by 20%, then agricultural residues production may increase by 25% over FY2010-FY2030.

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 In this research, we developed future renewal scenarios of sewage sludge incineration facilities in Wakayama City considering changes in population and sewage sludge generation in 2010-2040. We also evaluated the reduction effects in energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions when promoting centralized treatment of sewage sludge and introducing low-carbon technologies into the incineration process. From the analysis, we reached the following conclusions: 1) The centralized treatment of sewage sludge improves capacity utilization rate of facilities, and then brings the enhancement of scale effects in energy saving and GHG reduction. 2) To discontinue operation of incinerators with low efficiency of energy as soon as possible enhances the reduction effects of centralized treatment. 3) To make a transition to centralized treatment and introduce a low-carbon technology can reduce GHG by 19.2%, compared with usual incineration and renewal.

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 Japan suffered enormous damage from the Great East Japan Earthquake of March 11, 2011. Normally, in areas not equipped with sewage systems, human wastes from homes and businesses are transported by vacuum trucks to treatment facilities for proper disposal. When a disaster shuts down those facilities, however, the wastes can no longer be transported to the usual places and treatment at other facilities has to be requested. In this way a disaster can greatly alter the normal arrangements for transporting the wastes. From the standpoint of public sanitation, steps must be taken to prevent the wastes from being left in an unsanitary state. It is therefore important to provide a system for properly transporting human wastes to treatment facilities.
 The purpose of this research is to help make Japan more robust and contribute toward disaster readiness and disaster mitigation, in preparation for a megaquake expected to occur along the Nankai Trough. This paper focuses on a wide-area human waste treatment system and its optimization. Mathematical planning was used to create optimized models for facility provision planning and transport planning, respectively. When optimizing simulations were performed, the proposed models made it possible to determine the base facilities where temporary pits should be located and their capacities. The study also succeeded in quantitatively indicating the transport cost savings when waste transfer stations are introduced.

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 Reducing electric power usage in the water distribution system, which accounts for 60 to 70 percent of overall usage, is seen as a key to making water supply facilities more energy efficient. Earlier research devised an estimation equation for electric power usage by water distribution pumps at each water supply facility (filtration plants, water supply stations), and applied Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) to a model for minimizing electric power usage in the system as a whole (MILP model). The model used at the time of that research, however, suffered from a flaw, namely, the equations contained a constraint condition that the amount of water stored in the distributing reservoirs and the amount of fluctuation in that amount were matched at each point in time. This study therefore proposes a new model that corrects the constraint flaw, with the aim of achieving a further reduction in electric power usage.
 Simulations were conducted using the new model for a specific area in Tokyo. The results indicated that an alternate proposal for water supply control and management can be expected to reduce electric power usage by 6.9 percent while satisfying the circulation constraints. The study further analyzed the extent to which electric power usage worsens when fluctuations in the amount of water stored in distributing reservoirs are controlled. The validity of the model was shown as a result of simulations conducted from the standpoint of avoiding disaster risk. The strength of the model is its ability to find the optimal water distribution method that mostly meets demands from an energy efficiency standpoint while accounting for the constraints on water volume fluctuations in distributing reservoirs.

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