(I wrote the article for the 21st century column of Nytid Magazine, Oslo)

"I`m very proud that my school can produce its own electricity from the wind-mill. This is an alternative source and now we are taking a part to prevent the global warming..."

This is what a girl in an elementary school in the north-Japanese city of Hachinohe recently explained about the wind-generated electricity power in her school yard. This quote says some interesting about the new eco-trend of Japan. Hachinohe city is the first local authority in the world to conduct a full-scale project to produce electricity power from natural and alternative resources. Wind-generated and solar-generated electricity power are used throughout public facilities in the city.

The latest eco-trend now also spreads to national politics. Japan's Governing Party, Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), has confirmed that it will take the environmental issues such as global warming and reducing green house gases as the main theme for the upcoming Upper House General Election on July 22nd.
Meanwhile in the Asian Development Bank's (ADB) summit in Kyoto, May 7th, Japan pledged fresh fund for dealing with global climate change. This was for the first time the ADB Summit deliberated environmental-related issues in its meeting. Meanwhile in the US, Japan's biggest car manufacturer, Toyota, recorded all time high sales thanks to its well known environmental-friendly vehicles.

Japan has been long acknowledged as the pioneer of the environmental-friendly products, although to get everyone to become a "truly fanatic supporter" for this matter has taken a long and uneasy effort. Protokol Kyoto will come to force next year, and Japan is required to cut its carbon dioxide emission by 6 percent from its level in 1990. However, going green has its own stigma: the more green you go, the more expensive the price.

For years, we have listened to warnings about global climate change from experts. But until recently the predictions were somewhat far from our real life. Let the experts maintain their concern, and we -the ordinary people- should be living our life without much consideration about the ozone layer and other environment-related issues.

Unfortunately, now we are living in the middle of climate hysteria. Since the beginning of 2007, we have abruptly changed our attitude toward environment: Because of the melting of the snow on the Kilimanjaro Peak in East Africa; the warm winter in Europe and northern hemisphere; the chaotic local climate change, in Tokyo we had 10 minutes hail in April; the rise of sea level in Pacific which can shrink the small island country of Tuvalu, in South Pacific. Aha! We are living in the middle of those scary predictions!

As for Japan, the time has come for this country to begin a new role in the international arena in the framework of global collaboration. Japanese experts have been asked to quickly share their know-how to develop environmental friendly technology. Prime minister Shinzo Abe`s goverment has been busy responding to requests from other countries to reach agreements of technology transfers in energy savings. Universities has announced their latest research, such as producing bio-ethanol fuel from seaweed.

And then we have cities such as Hachinohe, where the whole community have worked together to reduce carbon dioxide emission. I realized that going green now has taken one step further. Thanks to the sufficient enviromental education program in this city, that little girl was not only saying what average children in other cities might say, "Please litter your rubbish in the bin or turn off the light to save the energy".

She indeed also claimed: "My school prevents the global warming..."
Oh, no..by listening to this little cute girl, I feel so left behind. So I say to my self: "Get up...go green, go green..no matter what!" (*)