This paper proposes a methodology to estimate sustainability indicators for the future and to judge whether world and regional scenarios satisfy the necessary conditions of sustainable development. The indicators examined in this study are the genuine savings (Sg) of the flow base, and changes in wealth per capita (w) of the stock base, both of which are among the World Development Indicators (WDI) proposed by the World Bank. David W. Pearce, Giles Atkinson, and Kirk Hamilton have claimed that it is a necessary condition for both of these indicators to be positive. The formal model in this study is based on the model of optimal growth theory proposed by Hamilton. Data required to estimate the two indicators are obtained from endogenous simulation output data by extending an existing integrated assessment model. We can estimate the indicators for the future until 2100 and for 10 regional divisions of the world. The estimations are preliminary and are not sufficient for detailed or conclusive discussions; however, results suggest that the necessary condition identified above is satisfied for the total world and for developed countries throughout the 21st century, but is not satisfied until the latter half of this century in the developing counties. We have established that i) indicators of future sustainability can be estimated based on the optimal growth theory; ii) the indicators can be obtained using consistent data obtained endogenously from the model; and iii) a conjoint analysis can be applied to make a single index (i.e., monetary term) from different factors of resources and environment. We successfully conducted the present methodology to indicate sustainable development indices and their results based on the Weak Sustainability; however, we have to continue our study to obtain policy implication toward future sustainability.

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Heat island phenomenon has been became to one of the serious problems that have been developed due to the concentrations of human activities on urban areas. Therefore, it is necessary to account for the surface form over urban area in order to understand the mechanism of heat island phenomenon. In this study, multiple linear regression analysis was applied between brightness temperature acquired from satellite images (Landsat-5/band6) and several urban area surface parameters that seem to affect the heat island phenomenon in the study area. The parameters used in the analysis are as follows thermal characteristic value, anthropogenic heat, ratio of green coverage, distance from north side of Tokyo Bay, elevation of average, and parameters of buildings form. The parameters of buildings form are consist of height of building, ratio of building sites, and building roughness that are the main constituent of the urban area. The result shows that during daytime, elevation of average increase brightness temperature, whereas the ratio of green coverage and height of building decrease brightness temperature. During nighttime, height of building, distance from north side of Tokyo Bay increase brightness temperature, whereas the ratio of green coverage, elevation of average decrease brightness temperature.

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Soil and groundwater pollution by toxic chemicals such as trichloroethylene, tetrachloroethylene, polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins, oils and heavy metals is of international concern. Various attempts are now being made to develop and evaluate groundwater and soil cleanup technologies. To clean up heavy metals and chlorinated compounds, physical and chemical remediation methods are commonly applied. However, these technologies are expensive. Therefore, the development of cheap and safe bioremediation technologies is of great concern . Bioremediation technologies use microorganisms to treat contaminants by enhancing natural biodegradation mechanisms through the additions of microorganisms, nutrients, electron donors and/or electron acceptors. In order to apply the effective bioaugmentation, isolation and characterization of effective microorganisms are very important. Characteristics of chlorinated ethane- and dioxine-deragading microorganisms are discussed. Moreover the future status of bioremediation is discussed.

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It would be highly desirable that we are able to estimate the bio-safety risks of the genetically modified microorganisms (GMM) for human health and the biological diversity with regard to the use of GMM. Thus, specific microorganisms that are used for bioremediation should be monitored; further, the safety of these microorganisms should be estimated. We developed technologies that enabled labeling of specific microorganisms using the marker gene and monitoring of the microbial community structure in the environment in which the specific microorganisms were introduced. We substituted certain nucleic acids without changing their amino acid sequences and obtained bphCm that had the same activity when compared with wild type bphC gene. Subsequently, the GMM (P putida KTTG39) possessing green and red fluorescence proteins and bphCm gene were constructed. The genetically engineered P putida KTTG39 was inoculated into the activated sludge which was employed as the model ecological system. The outcomes of the inoculated P putida and the microbial community structure could be estimated by using real-time quantitative Q-probe PCR and PCR-DGGE, respectively. In conclusion, we demonstrated that the combined use of the GMM and the mo lecular technologies were useful for evaluating the impact of the GMM in the natural environment.

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Soil pollution by several kinds of oil products, mainly manufactured from crude oil, has beenfound at various sites such as service stations, oil refineries, former factory sites, landfill, and evenresidential area. Although physical or chemical methods can be applied to treat the contaminatedsoil, bioremediation is regarded as an efficient and low cost method because oil can be easilydegraded by indigenous microorganisms. New types of bioremediation have been developed andapplied, i.e., biosparging method to treat the soil under building, biopuffer multi-system to cleansilty type of contaminated soil, and bio-heat-pile method to accelerate biodegradation process evenunder winter season or at the colder region.

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We studied both aerobic and anaerobic bioremediation technologies for soil and groundwater contaminated with volatile chlorinated organic compounds . The aerobic treatment focuses on bioaugmentation utilizing a methanotrophic bacterium, Methylocystis strain M (strain M), while the anaerobic treatment emphasizes the application of dechlorination process to biostimulation and bioaugmentation. In bioaugmentation experiments using strain M, we mixed the cultured strain M directly with an unsaturated loam, and found that this simple mixing practice was limited to the soil at low contaminant concentrations. As the anaerobic dechlorination treatment, we have developed a biostimulation technology, Terra-Reduction Method (TRM), in which a trace amount of reducing agent and nutrients was ammended to contaminated soil. The reducing agent generates the strong reductive environment where the nutrients are served as substrates for microbial growth. Site application and laboratory studies showed that TRM was able to reduce the comtamination level to the environmental quality standards in two to three months without accumulation of intermediates such as cis-1, 2dichloroethylene and vinyl chloride. Further experiments of the anaerobic soil treatment showed that inoculation of Dehalococcoides sp. to contaminated soil was effective as a cleanup method . We confirmed that adding the enrichment culture of Dehalococcoides sp . in the density of about 5.0 ? 103 cells/g-soil to the contaminated soil to which TRM was not effective, causes enough effect . To evaluate the applicability of TRM to a pollution site rapidly, we developed a bioassay technique using the enrichment culture of Dehalococcoides sp . and the genetic diagnostics to detect Dehalococcoides sp.. Using both methods, a highly reliable evaluation became possible within one week.

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The Japanese Soil Contamination Countermeasures Law came in to force in Feb . 2003, and has resulted in an increase in the number of soil contamination surveys being undertaken . This has in turn led to an increase in the number of sites known to have contamination levels in excess of the environmental quality standard (EQS). As a result there is a greater need for a wider variety of techniques to deal with the diverse range of sites identified. Phytoremediation is a strong candidate for certain types of contamination. Phytoremediation, which is defined as the technology using plants to reduce or remove pollution from the environment, has the advantages of low cost and low environmental impact. According to the survey results published in November 2006 by the Ministry of Environment, arsenic and its compounds are identified as the second most common heavy metal that exceeded the EQS. In Japan, phytoremediation of arsenic by using the hyperaccumulator fern (Pteris vittata) has being applied to a number of contaminated sites. However, the process is relatively slow (often taking in excess of one year) and it is not so effective against very high levels of contamination. Thus it is very important to carry out a treatability test at the project planning stage in order to estimate the suitability of the technique for a particular site . In this article, we review about our approaches to establish the arsenic phytoremediation and the outlook of this technology.

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Using the framework of life cycle theory of scientific research and the frame work of higher education policy, and comparing with Schools of Engineering, this paper described the establishing mechanism of Environment-related departments in Schools of Agriculture. As a result, the higher education policy, especially the reform of the Schools of Agriculture, as well as the efforts of establishment of Environmental Science turns out to be one of the most important factors to the establishment mechanism of Environment-related departments. Also, there is a disciplinary difference in these departments established between 1st boom and 2nd boom. The latter is similar to Environment-related departments in Schools of Engineering.

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