METI (the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry) designated the Kansai (Keihanna) Science City region as a “Next-Generation Energy and Social Systems Demonstration region” for the five year period from 2010 to 2015. This resulted in the “Keihanna Eco City Next-generation Energy and Social Systems Demonstration Project,” a collaboration between educational institutions, government agencies, and the private sector.
Starting with Kyoto, the project involved 26 local authorities, businesses, and other groups cooperating to form the Keihanna Eco-City Promotion Council. Within Kyoto, the demonstration areas of Kyotonabe, Kizugawa, and Seika were established along with the three fields of home, business, and transportation. Demonstration projects were conducted with the cooperation of building tenants and users, hotel guests, and buyers of electric cars.
A variety of energy management systems were employed in order to effectively manage the regions energy in order to achieve reductions in CO2, energy use, and peak energy use without adversely affecting citizens’ quality of life. I will discuss the results of this demonstration, the feedback received from businesses which participated in the project, and offer my take on how to best approach the “smart community model” moving forward.

Urban governance and local policies have to face growing challenges in a global economy and a growing social complexity. Regional and metropolitan scales are gaining importance in governing cities, as well as new demands for innovating new sorts of institutional arrangements and policy tools to address a 21st century governance. This session will gather speakers that are putting into practice new ideas and projects to innovate in the way they engage with citizens, creating contexts for collaboration with other institutions and build future city models and visions.