The Japan Research Institute Joins Partnership Agreement for Promoting Kikai Town's Regional Decarbonization Vision

Kikai Town (Mayor: Etsuo Kumazaki) has announced that The Japan Research Institute (President: Jun Uchikawa, hereinafter 'JRI') has joined the 'Partnership Agreement on Promoting Kikai Town's Regional Decarbonization Vision' originally concluded on July 17, 2024, with Chiyoda Corporation (President: Koji Ota), Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (President & CEO: Akihiro Fukutome), and Sumitomo Mitsui Finance and Leasing Company (President: Tetsuro Imaeda). JRI, which is engaged in multifaceted research and support aimed at balancing regional decarbonization and regional revitalization, has endorsed the purpose and objectives of this agreement.

1. Background

Kikai Island, where Kikai Town is located, is part of the Amami Islands between Kagoshima and Okinawa, and is one of the world's rare uplifted coral reef islands. Kikai Island has cultivated its own unique natural environment, culture, and history by utilizing coral reefs as regional resources.

On the other hand, the increasing size and frequency of typhoons and heavy rainfall due to climate change pose a major threat to the stable energy supply for Kikai Town, which is located far from Kyushu and Amami Oshima and is not connected to external power grids. Therefore, improving disaster resilience (supply stability and recovery capability) is an urgent issue.

Kikai Town is also facing various challenges, including a shortage of successors for agriculture—the core industry—and sluggish growth in tourist and exchange populations. Furthermore, structural issues are becoming apparent, such as the difficulty in ensuring the sustainability of public infrastructure due to a declining population.

In the closed social system of an island, achieving comprehensive, medium- to long-term solutions requires building an autonomous community through the promotion of energy and resource circulation within the region.

2. Significance and Value of JRI's Participation

Against this backdrop, in July 2024, Kikai Town, Chiyoda Corporation, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, and Sumitomo Mitsui Finance and Leasing concluded a partnership agreement aimed at promoting the regional decarbonization vision, setting forth the 'Kikai Island Zero Carbon Island Concept' to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050 while preserving and inheriting the island's culture, nature, and landscape. Since then, they have been working on concretizing and implementing this concept, focusing on energy, economy, and transportation.

In this agreement, JRI will examine business schemes for establishing a public-private entity. Leveraging its extensive experience in community development, JRI will provide integrated support from formulating social infrastructure models to their social implementation, fostering closer cooperation between Kikai Town and the participating companies.

Moving forward, by approaching initiatives in individual fields cross-sectionally and comprehensively, and by advancing decarbonization efforts in tandem with solving regional issues, the project aims to simultaneously address multiple challenges faced by Kikai Town through the introduction of storage batteries and the utilization of solar power, biomass power, and blue carbon.

This agreement will generate co-benefits (effects that balance regional decarbonization and regional revitalization) in Kikai Town and further accelerate the construction of a 'sustainable social infrastructure model.'