World Student Community for Sustainable Development

Today we are pleased to announce that the AGS-UTSC is hosting a student-based workshop in the AGS-AM 2010 in Tokyo. The AGS-AM is an annual meeting of the AGS member schools that include Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Chalmers University of Technology and University of Tokyo. The AGS-AM 2010 Student Project is a student-based initiative for motivated and foresighted students in sustainability fields of study from the world community. The theme of the Student Project is “Growing Asian Cities: Structuring Sustainability Problems.” Our activities include lectures, group work, presentation and field trip. We are especially focusing on sustainability problems in the Asian context, as Asia is one of the most important regions for the world’s development in the 21st century.

Please find more detail in our website: http://ags-utsc.org/AM2010-Tokyo/english/index.html

If you are interested and willing to participate in the Student Project, please fill the application form attached and send it to agsam2010application@gmail.com by January 22nd, 2010.

If you have any questions, please email to am2010tokyostudentproject@gmail.com.

We are looking forward to your application!

Yoshimasa Takahashi
The Outreach Director of the AGS-AM 2010 Student Project

The University of Tokyo Energy Club g-Enesis is one of working groups of SUS+. Our activities aim to consider sustainable energy use from international and interdisciplinary view. Sustainable energy use has a critical meaning when we think of sustainable society because current energy use based on fossil fuel not only causes climate change problems but also decreases the reserves of energy sources. We have three main activities to contribute to sustainable energy use: (1)Study Seminars, (2)International Exchanges (e.g. MIT Energy Conference) and (3) Policy Proposals (e.g. eco japan cup 2009).
Here we would like to introduce eco japan cup 2009, which is the contest related to environmental policy and business and hosted by Japanese government and companies. In July 2009, we decided to join the policy contest of eco japan cup 2009 and organized a project team which consisted of two Japanese students and four exchange students. Through the discussions in summer vacation for three months, we made three proposals to submit to the contest: (1)Matching project to spread solar panels in regional areas, (2)Weekend day light saving and (3)Green knowledge broker. As a result, first proposal won the excellent prize in the contest. The proposal aimed to increase the number of solar panels in Japan. It was very up-to-date in Japanese society because the government announced the high reduction target (25% by 2020) while Japan faced a serious depression. Increasing solar panels was expected to overcome both problems at the same time (called Green New Deal Policy). After the announcement of the prize, we attended the awards ceremony and made a presentation in eco products 2009 which is one of the biggest environmental exhibitions in Japan.
Through the participation in eco japan cup 2009, we could show that students from different countries and disciplines can cooperate toward the common goal and make some achievements. Since international and interdisciplinary cooperation is the key factor to realize sustainable society, our experience there seemed to be meaningful. Also, through the contest, we could make new networks with researchers, business persons and policy makers who have the same vision with our club. Making use of this opportunity, we would like to seek for the possibility of collaboration beyond sectors such as the university, company and government.
In next March, four members of our club will join MIT Energy Conference 2010 to get newer information about energy business and technology. We hope that our club can keep expanding our activities and contribute to realize sustainable energy use.