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Nippon Oil and its group company Nippon Oil Staging Terminal Company, Limited, an operator of petroleum storage and terminal facilities in Japan’s Kagoshima Prefecture, has won the fifth Nikkei Monozukuri Award for a facility that extracts energy from harmful volatile organic compounds (VOCs) contained in emissions from crude oil tankers. These emissions, called “exhaust gas,” are the vapors released from crude oil during tanker voyages, and large amounts are normally vented during loading and unloading.
Since 2004, Nippon Oil and Nippon Oil Staging Terminal have conducted joint academic-industrial research with the University of Kagoshima on the |
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characteristics of exhaust gases. This resulted in the May 2007 launch of Japan’s first facility for processing exhaust gases from crude oil tankers.
The facility processes 31 million m3 of exhaust gas annually, recovering about 70% of the VOCs and extracting about 10,000 kiloliters crude oil-equivalent of energy annually. The recovery process, developed by the Nippon Oil Group, is the first in the world to absorb the VOCs through crude oil instead of conventional kerosene or activated carbon. Emissions not recovered are processed through a decomposition (cracking) system.
Japanese media giant Nikkei Inc. has awarded the Nikkei Monozukuri Award annually since 2004 to promote monozukuri* as a driver of the Japanese economy, honoring exceptional achievements of factories and research labs in Japan and abroad.
* A Japanese term meaning approximately “quality and innovation in manufacturing.” |
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Yusen Terminals Inc. (YTI), a wholly owned subsidiary of NYK, has been recognized by the Los Angeles City Council for its efforts to protect the environment. A ceremony was held on September 19, 2008, and YTI president Yoshio Watanabe and vice-president Joe DiMassa attended.
Among the achievements, YTI is the first container terminal at the Port of Los Angeles to receive ISO 14001 certification, the international standard for environmental management. In November 2007, the terminal also |
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became the first to implement ship-to-shore Alternative Maritime Power™ (AMP™). This technology reduces polluting emissions from docked container vessels by enabling the ships to “plug in” to a shore-side electricity outlet, instead of running on diesel power.
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This is the second environment-related award for the company to receive since July 2008, when the company was recognized by the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.
“We are Los Angeles’ partner in environmental progress,” said Watanabe at the ceremony. “We pledge our commitment to work with L.A. to make our port environment a better, cleaner and safer place to live and work.” |
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The U.S. commercial sector is increasingly turning to solar power as a way of hedging against oil price rises and other energy cost increases, and to help to protect the environment.
Mitsubishi Electric has worked to develop photovoltaic modules using lead-free solder to further enhance the modules’ environmental benefits. These efforts bore substantial fruit when Limoneira Company, a California-based grower and seller of lemons and other fruit, picked the lead-free modules for use in its orchards. Limoneira is actively working to reduce its environmental impact, and the lead-free solder was a deciding factor in the purchase.
The project’s completion was announced on October 28, 2008 by Perpetual Power (P2), the solar energy development company contracted for |
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the construction, and supplier Mitsubishi Electric & Electronics USA, Inc.
The 6,400 modules, capable of supplying 1.2 MW, cover some 22,260 m2 and will meet about one-third of Limoneira’s energy needs. Surrounding vegetation helps to prevent surface dust from building up and diminishing power output. Sheep graze on the vegetation, keeping it low so that it does not block the sunlight. There is also an observation deck where visitors can learn about solar energy.
Mitsubishi Electric has also provided photovoltaic modules for a 1.9 MW installation at California-based agribusiness Wm. Bolthouse Farms, and will also supply modules for an installation at Constellation Wines U.S.’s Gonzales Winery in California. |
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The Tokio Marine Group is actively reducing its environmental impact through paper recycling, use of biodegradable materials and more. One key initiative has been launched by the Mexican subsidiary Tokio Marine Compañía de Seguros, S.A. de C.V (TMX).
Since 2006, TMX has organized annual reforestation activities together with local NGO NATURALIA, which coordinates the event and cares for the young trees. In 2006, 500 trees were planted in Cuajimalpa, Mexico City, followed by 3,000 trees in Tepotzotlán in the State of Mexico in 2007.
In the third outing on August 23, 2008, the area of focus was the Lagunas de Zempoala national park in the suburbs of Mexico City. Having left the city at 7 a.m. in four hired buses, 183 staff members and their families worked alongside 10 NATURALIA members and 20 local residents to plant some 3,500 pine saplings.
After hours of hard work, the participants rightly felt proud of their achievement. But, they also felt a |
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great responsibility, knowing that the vulnerable saplings would take years to grow into tall, sturdy trees.
In a few years, the team will surely want to come back to this place to see how the trees have grown. Until then, however, there will be many, many more trees to plant, as TMX continues with its successful initiative. |
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Around the world, decade upon decade of industrial development has left huge tracts of land contaminated with industrial chemicals, petroleum residues, pesticides and more.
While many effective decontamination solutions exist, the lack of a single method for cleaning up many different contaminants at once has been a persistent problem—each contaminant would require a separate clean-up method, making decontamination complicated, time-consuming and expensive.
However, in a joint project, Mitsubishi Gas Chemical (MGC) and Kajima Corporation have taken a huge step forward on this issue. In September 2008, the two companies announced a unique on-site soil decontamination technique that effectively decomposes harmful volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, in soil and groundwater. The new method combines two separate techniques: Mild Fenton treatment, a new VOC decontamination technique in which a reaction between hydrogen peroxide and a new MGC-developed biodegradable catalyst enables break-down of organic contaminants in a wide range of soil pH values, and the Jet Blend method, Kajima’s proprietary design and construction technology for soil and groundwater decontamination.
The Mild Fenton treatment-Jet Blend method proved highly effective in a trial decontamination at a site where the second water table had been polluted by two types of contaminants. Whereas conventional technology would have required a combination of two or more methods, the new treatment enabled complete decontamination within only three months. |
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