clean energy – INEB Eco Temple

Tera Energy: An Interview with Co-Founder Rev. Tsuruno Koyu

Linus — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 12:35:28 +0000

Tera Energy: “Illuminating” Society with New Electric Power

Buddhist Priests Supporting Entrepreneurial NPOs

An Interview with Rev. Tsuruno Koyu, Co-founder

Beyond COVID-19 Series: Interview #53

Bunka Jiho newspaper Friday 10 October 2025

Article by Sakamoto Yuri

Translated and edited by Jonathan S. Watts

You can read more about Tera Energy and its background here.

The new electricity company Tera Energy Co., Ltd. was founded in 2018 by four Buddhist priests in Kyoto City with Rev. Takemoto Ryogo serving as president. These priests were initially involved in suicide prevention with Sotto: the Kyoto Suicide Prevention Centre in Kyoto. Having seen the suicide issue as the tip of the iceberg of a myriad of social issues that have emerged with the downturn in Japan’s economy since the 1990s, these priests decided to work on a more holistic response.[1] We spoke to Tera Energy’s director, Rev. Tsuruno Koyu 霍野廣由 (38), a founding member and head of their new disaster prevention division, about their activities for “illuminating” society.

Revs. Koyu Tsurono, Ryogo Takemoto, Makoto Honda, Keio Kimoto (left to right)

Sacrificing Profits to Gain Donations

Rev. Tsuruno noted, “After finishing graduate school, I joined an NPO where we struggled with fundraising. Looking around, I saw many charitable organisations facing the same problem. To solve these financial issues, we launched this business, Tera Energy.”

Q: But why electricity?

A: Our team was exploring ways to create a system where funds would flow to Buddhist temples nationwide engaged in social work with non-profit organizations (NPO). During this period, Rev. Takemoto learned of an example in Germany where ordinary citizens had established an electric power company and were returning a portion of the profits to the community. This was around the time of the liberalisation of the Japanese electricity industry began[2], and he thought, “This is what I’ve been looking for.”[3]

Q: As a Buddhist priest starting a business, and specifically an electricity company, did you face criticism?

A: The media reported, “Priests from the Jodo Shin sect have founded an electricity company”, and footage of our head temple, the Nishi Hongan-ji, was shown. Nishi Hongan-ji received complaints from parishioners nationwide, which caused them troubles. However, we explained our intentions and gained their understanding.

Q: It’s been seven years since the launch. How has it gone?

A: There were several precarious moments. The electricity market became turbulent, and the more we sold, the deeper came the losses. At such times, various temples came to our aid. It is precisely because of this support that we are still operating today.

Q: I understand a portion of your profits is then donated?

A: Among roughly 700 competitors, we rank around 70th in sales, placing us within the top 10%. People often assume the donation amount is added to electricity bills, but that’s not the case. We are actually cutting into our profits to make these donations. We go to such lengths, because we understand the strain of sustaining social initiatives. Rather than monopolising profits, we remain committed to the founding principle that, “Happiness and prosperity lie in sharing”.

Q: This solid philosophy and narrative form Tera Energy’s strength, don’t you think?

A: I believe so. With electricity liberalisation, users switch providers as easily as they change mobile phone contracts when cheaper new services emerge. However, those who sign up because they resonate with our values rarely leave. Our customer turnover rate is significantly lower than competitors’ precisely because they value aspects beyond price.

Fire Service Collaboration and Disaster Prevention Events

In 2023, aiming to accelerate decarbonisation, Tera Energy concluded a cooperation agreement with Kyoto City. By 2025, they were selected as a partner organisation for the Kyoto City Fire Department.

Q: In your sales activities, what kind of response have you received from temples?

A: While terms like “climate change” and “decarbonization” don’t particularly capture temples’ interest, mentioning their potential as disaster-preparedness hubs for the community gets a positive response. Some temples involved in disaster relief efforts, such as after the Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011, have installed solar panels and storage batteries, because they want to be there for their community in times of need. We’re gradually connecting with temples that share this mindset.

Senju-in Temple in Kamaishi City, Iwate Prefecture served as an emergency shelter after the great tsunami of 2011

Q: Temples serve as local hubs during disasters, providing shelters and communal meals. So you all felt it was novel for temples to be involved from the awareness-raising stage before disasters occur?

A: I heard that Myofuku-ji Temple 妙福寺 of the Honmon Butsuri sect of the Nichiren and Lotus Sutra tradition, which supports Tera Energy, had signed a formal agreement with Fushimi Ward in Kyoto to serve as a designated evacuation site during disasters. However, we were concerned about how well this was recognised locally and whether it could truly function as an evacuation centre when disaster struck. During a conversation with their abbot, Rev. Matsumoto Genkun 松本現薫, the idea arose to hold events at the temple to help people understand that, “This temple is actively involved in disaster preparedness, so please evacuate here if needed.”

In September this year, we held a disaster prevention event at Mibu-dera Temple 壬生寺—the head temple of the ancient Ritsu sect based on the practice of the bhikkhu vinaya—in collaboration with the City Fire Department in Kyoto. It was well received by local residents, who requested we hold it again next year, and other temples also expressed interest. Having gained the know-how, we believe we can now offer this service. That said, organising events incurs costs. We intend to seek sponsors to ensure the project’s continuity.

Q: I understand you are assisting the City Fire Department in promoting and raising awareness of their seismic-sensitive circuit breaker initiative. What exactly is a seismic-sensitive circuit breaker?

A: It is equipment that automatically trips the circuit breaker and cuts the power when it detects a major earthquake of seismic intensity 5 or higher. In discussions with the fire department, I heard their concern that although it’s a good device, it isn’t widely recognised. Installing it in temples, which often have many wooden structures, would be extremely helpful. Furthermore, many of Tera Energy’s customers are very interested in social issues. That’s why we decided to assist with its promotion and awareness. The manufacturer also passionately explained that installing it in shrines and temples holds significant social value. We plan to visit soon the Fujisan Hongu Sengen Taisha Shinto shrine in Shizuoka Prefecture, which already has it installed, for an inspection.”

The Company is the Means; the Purpose is Support

Q: How do you envision expanding support for charitable organisations going forward?

A: We currently donate to around 150 organisations. While our focus has been on connecting with various groups, our new approach will involve deeper communication with these established connections, promoting Tera Energy to both the organisations and their supporters. However, we are not primarily interested in selling electricity. We use the donation-linked electricity scheme solely as a means to support non-profit organizations (NPOs) and NGOs. We are currently renewing our website and aim to create a platform, similar to crowdfunding, where NPOs and supporters can connect.

Q: So your company’s goal is what, precisely?

A: We will generate solid electricity sales revenue to fund donations. However, our primary measure of success will be “how much we donate”, not “how much we sell”. We aim to reach ¥100 million ($640,000) in donations.

Profile: Rev. Tsuruno Koyu was born in 1987 in Kaku-enji temple of the Jodo Shin-shu Honganji denomination in the town of Kamo in Fukuoka Prefecture in southern Japan, where he presently serves as the vice-abbot. After graduating from the Ryukoku University Graduate School of Practical Shin Buddhist Studies, he joined the certified NPO Sotto: the Kyoto Suicide Prevention Centre, where he currently serves as a director. He is also a part-time lecturer at So-ai University and a member of the Jodo Shin-shu Hongan-ji denomination Children and Youth Connection Promotion Committee. This year, he presided over the “International Expo Temple” 万博寺 event at the Osaka-Kansai Expo, which brought together priests from various sects.

[1] The original article included this sentence in the introduction: “With an eye on the future a thousand years hence, it [Tera Energy] focuses on disaster prevention to foster a spiritually rich, secure, and safe way of life.” As noted later in the interview, disaster prevention is a popular topic among Buddhist temples in Japan. Thus, the publisher seems to have wanted to attract the attention of readers through this sentence, which is a rather limited way of depicting Tera Energy’s mission. The translator has augmented this introduction by connecting Tera Energy’s original mission to suicide prevention.

[2] Liberalization of Japan’s electricity industry began in stages, starting with wholesale market opening for Independent Power Producers (IPPs) in 1995, followed by retail deregulation for large industrial users in 2000, then expanding to medium-sized businesses by 2005, and culminating in the full liberalization for all consumers (including homes) in April 2016.

[3] Such a mechanism had already been created in Japan by another Buddhist priest named Rev. Okochi Hidehito in Tokyo around 1999. During the establishment of Tera Energy, Rev. Takemoto was introduced to and visited Rev. Okochi’s temple. The two are now both members of INEB’s international Eco-Temple Network.

A Sri Lanka – Japan Collaboration

Linus — Wed, 01 Oct 2025 04:13:30 +0000

Into the 21st Century with Holistic Buddhist Development for Urban Spaces

by Jonathan S. Watts

September 28, 2025

A Holistic Buddhist Development Lineage

For three days in early September 2025, the holistic Buddhist development world came full circle at a workshop entitled “Urban Dhamma in Action: Empowering Temples for Sustainable Community Development”, co-hosted by the Sri Lanka Network of Engaged Buddhists (SriNEB) and the Japan Network of Engaged Buddhists (JNEB). The meaning of “full circle” encapsulates the almost 70 year history of the holistic Buddhist development movement, starting with the Sarvodaya Shramadana movement founded by Dr. A.T. Ariyaratne in 1958 in Sri Lanka. This movement spread into Thailand in the 1970s when the leading founder of the International Network of Engaged Buddhists (INEB), Sulak Sivaraksa, sent a monk named Luang Pau Nan from Thailand’s impoverished Northeast to study with Sarvodaya. Nan went on to become the beacon of the Thai Development Monk movement, which continues today with monks like Phra Sangkom Thanapanyo Khunsiri who also hails from Luang Pau Nan’s native area of Surin. In the 1980s, the leader of the Japanese Buddhist NGO Movement, Rev. Jitsujo Arima who founded the Japan Soto-shu Releif Committee (JSRC) (now called Shanti), encountered Nan and greatly inspired, published a book about his work in Japanese. In the 1990s, Prof. Jun Nishikawa, a professor of development economics at Waseda University, published a collective study of the Thai development monk movement and coined a new term for holistic Buddhist development in Japanese, called kaihotsu, in contrast to mainstream development, called kaihatsu.[1]

Alas, the holistic Buddhist development movement has been slow to grow in Japan. This has been due in part to conservatism in the Buddhist world as well as mainstream society and the reluctance to criticize the nation’s development model. In the postwar era, this model created great material prosperity but for the past three decades has stagnated into what is now called the Disconnected Society (mu-en shakai), rife with suicide and mental illness. It also seems that Japanese Buddhists have not been able to fully understand the message of Rev. Arima who called for a horizontal solidarity of learning and exchange between Japan and southern Asia. This is a way to not only heal the wounds of Japan’s imperialism but also to chart a new path of development beyond the Western dominated models of capitalism and communist socialism. Instead, while many of the Japanese Buddhist NGOs that emerged in the 1980s and 90s have delivered emergency aid to areas in southern Asia, the paradigm has remained one of a “wealthy” northern nation coming to the aid of “lowly impoverished” southern ones.

Holistic Buddhist Development in Urban Japan

There has been one priest in particular, however, who has taken Rev. Arima’s message and the work of Sarvodaya and the Thai development monks to heart. Rev. Hidehito Okochi, a priest of the Jodo Pure Land denomination, was one of the founding members of the AYUS International Buddhist Cooperation Network in 1993, which remains today one of the more dynamic of the Japanese Buddhist NGOs. Rev. Okochi’s experience travelling abroad on AYUS activities as well as study trips radicalized him in a different way than others. Rather than just focusing on the emergency needs in these countries, which he saw as symptoms of a larger illness, he used the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths to investigate more deeply into the causes of these needs and the suffering of their people. His analysis exposed the culpability of the United States, Europe, and Japan in their colonial and neo-colonial exploitation of these areas. Moving into the 3^rd and 4^th Noble Truths, Okochi saw that he not only needed to support such people in solidarity but to work inside Japan on development issues that have led to the same kinds of suffering in his own country, for example, the debacle of nuclear energy development that goes well beyond the Fukushima disaster. As the abbot of two different temples inside of Tokyo city, Okochi has studied and learned from the south and has developed a wide variety of community development activities, not as a heroic, charismatic dharma master but in solidarity and cooperation with local and regional citizens organizations.

From this background, Rev. Okochi has been creating more connections with like-minded Buddhists across Asia through the INEB Eco-Temple Community Development Network, founded in 2016 with his active participation. In May, another of Okochi’s groups in Japan called the Buddhism Social Ethics in Contemporary Japan Study Group hosted INEB Chairman Harsha Navaratne, who helped build Sarvodaya in its early years, for a talk in Japan on “Religion and Civil Society in Japan and Asia: Learning from the Theory and Practice of Buddhist Development (kaihotsu)”. From this event, a collaboration between SriNEB and JNEB was born for this full circle moment: Rev. Okochi introducing a new brand of urban holistic Buddhist development to compliment the well-established form of rural holistic Buddhist development.

Meeting the Challenges of Urban Development in the South through Buddhism

As SriNEB explains, “Sri Lanka’s urban temples are vibrant centers of faith, yet their potential as engines of community transformation remains untapped. While rural temples excel in integrated development, our urban sangha faces unique challenges, such as: 1) limited social engagement beyond Sunday schools and rituals, 2) a lack of strategies for untapped resources, such as land and even solar panel installations, which can be used for broader community benefit, and 3) a lack of practical skills for young monks to address urban suffering and temple sustainability.” Indeed, while Buddhist temples in southern Asia have engaged in a variety of forms of rural development work, they have been slow to adapt to the new landscape of consumer-capitalist-driven urban environments, often getting drawn into this unskillful consumerist culture themselves, and resulting in the loss of trust and confidence by urban lay Buddhists. The three-day program with Rev. Okochi thus sought to provide an opportunity to learn from experiences in one of the most highly consumer capitalist economies in Japan while beginning to experiment with creative local responses in Sri Lanka.

The Four Noble Truths Socialized for Collective Change

The workshop revolved around temple mapping exercises using the Four Noble Truths and three learning modules related to Rev. Okochi’s work. On the morning of the first day, participants created extensive maps of their temples on large sheets of paper that charted buildings, land, social services, and human resources, while considering their levels of integration. There were 13 participants in total: 10 monks and 3 fully ordained nuns (bhikkhuni) from all three major sects (nikaya) in Sri Lanka. They came from three districts in the environs of Colombo, so are largely dealing with urban issues, although some are in suburban areas that are impacted by environmental destruction going on in adjacent rural areas. A more urban based, environmental problem common to group members is water: poor drainage and flooding in the rainy seasons, degradation and drying up of wells and the water table, pollution of local water increasing the rate of dengue fever, etc. These problems were often connected to others, such as garbage disposal and an increase in garbage from consumer lifestyles. Another main area of dukkha is “mental ecology” with high rates of drug addiction and suicide, especially among the young, as well as challenges in dealing with the elderly and end-of-life care.

In the afternoon, Rev. Okochi spoke about his life path and how he became conscientized to go beyond the typical view of providing charitable aid to the South. An essential part of this process was developing a sophisticated, contemporary understanding of the Buddha’s classical teaching of the Four Noble Truths. Dukkha, in this case, is not individualized as existential suffering but socialized into solidarity with the suffering of common citizens both within Japan and globally. This creates the impetus to “go forth” (pabbajja), as the Buddhist instructed his disciples, which in a contemporary context means the Buddhist monk leaving the friendly and comfortable confines of the temple and learning how to engage with suffering in the sometimes unfamiliar confines of the secular world. Samudaya, the causes of the dukkha, are also not limited to the psychological realms of greed-anger-delusion but are externalized as structural violence and its partner-in-crime, cultural violence, found in the values, beliefs, and rationalizations for creating systems of dukkha. As Rev. Okochi notes, this is the essential level of understanding and necessary wisdom needed before actions can take place. Without such deep investigation, nirvana as a vision “of the world to be aimed for” and magga as the path of action can fall into simplistic acts of charity and even well-intentioned but rather neo-colonial forms of “aid”. As a way of further contextualizing this teaching to the ordained monk and nun participants, the basic forms of emergency aid work known as Holding Actions are explained as shamatha, the first step in Buddhist meditation that calms the body and mind yet does not root out greed-anger-delusion, ignorance, and hence dukkha. Shamatha creates the space for the deeper work of vipassana or insight, which in this case translates into the creation of Alternative Social Structures and Shifts in Consciousness and Culture.[2]

Over the next day and a half, participants learned and worked on three modules based around three key areas of engagement in Rev. Okochi’s work (which have been documented in various articles and publications):

creating local, solar energy projects as a basis for social enterprise to fund community development.
using various properties and social assets owned by the temple for community-based education, medical welfare, and various forms of civic engagement as a new urban commons.
linking the temple and urban consumers with alternative, rural development organizations for sustainable living, especially ecological housing.

In the breaks between Rev. Okochi’s presentations of these three modules, participants began to analyze their temple maps based on the Four Noble Truths process: first, identifying the real life, experienced problems of the temple and the community; second, struggling to figure out the various levels of causes and their interconnections; and then, beginning to chart a vision and plan of action as the 3^rd and 4^th Noble Truths.

In examining Rev. Okochi’s path, we see a common pattern in the way the 3^rd and 4^th Noble truths emerged that was instructive to the participants in designing their own plans. Generally, Rev. Okochi and his partners have created an initial study group to examine a specific set of issues of concern. This intensified inquiry into the 1^st and 2^nd Noble Truths becomes the first step of the 3^rd and 4^th in educational activities for community conscientization, a collective form of wisdom practice (panna). From this foundation, individual activities in daily life have been imagined, such as more ecological consumption, as a form of social virtue or discipline (sila). From this step, there is a major transformation that needs to take place in the shift to group activities to create new social systems—perhaps understood as the “concentration” (samadhi) of energy (virya), generosity (dana), and patience (ksanti) as all six paramitas emerge in the social development process. This step is indeed a great one that many religious-based organizations cannot envision or develop while remaining stuck in the efforts of individual virtue. For Okochi, the key to this transformation is a dedicated and deep inquiry into the 2^nd Noble Truth. As the mechanisms of power and exploitation become clearer through analysis and critical thought, creative alternatives more naturally arise.

“Going Forth” Beyond Religious-based Charity to Social Transformation

Certainly, in such a short three-day workshop, an exhaustive analysis and comprehensive action plan could not be made by the participants. It was important, rather, that the participants began to develop an understanding of and skill in using the Four Noble Truths method. From this basis, they are being encouraged to deepen their understanding by creating study-action-praxis groups in their own communities. Further, the organizers have developed a post-workshop follow up plan to nurture each of these monastics as well as to work on common issues as a collective.

An initial step will be the physical gathering of participants in one month’s time to continue to work on their social analysis and action plans using the Four Noble Truths. This time will also enable for further solidarity and sharing among the group. From this, there will be online Zoom meetings with Rev. Okochi for further study and inquiry every month for three months (November, December, January). By February, there is a plan for the aforementioned Thai development monk, Phra Sangkom from Thailand, who is a founding member of the INEB Eco-Temple Network, to make site visits to temples that need support for water management and groundwater rejuvenation. The organizers also plan to conduct their own site visits and eventually expand the group of participants beyond the three districts around Colombo.

In conclusion, this event was very much a pilot one. It was the first time for Rev. Okochi and the JNEB network to present his work in a systematic three-day workshop. This required “skillful means” (upaya) at various points to ensure the participants remained engaged in the sometimes dizzying integration and complexity of Rev. Okochi’s work. Yet there is incredible potential benefit in this work and not only in helping monastics and temple communities grapple with the challenges of urban life. There is also the need to more deeply conscientize Buddhists in northern countries, who also have not learned properly from their southern brethren of the violence of what Joanna Macy called the Industrial Growth Society. In keeping with the 1^st Noble Truth of dukkha, this issue should no longer be an East-West or North-South one but a collective one of our humanity.

follow up planning with SriNEB & JNEB members

Finally, the organizers would like to thank the Sri Devram Viharaya Temple and Ven. Kolonnawe Siri Sumangala Thero, Chief Incumbent, for their generous support in hosting the program for three days, and also Mr. Bandula Perera of Kaihatsu Management Consulting Lanka, whose tri-lingual interpretation of Sinhala-Japanese-English was invaluable in our communications.

[1] For more on the work of Rev. Arima and Prof. Nishikawa, see Watts, Jonathan S. Engaged Buddhism in Japan, Vols. 1 & 2. (Ottowa: The Sumeru Press, 2023).

[2] The concepts of Holding Actions, Alternative Social Structures, and Shifts in Consciousness and Culture were created by Joanna Macy, another pioneer in this field of holistic Buddhist Development. She, too, was was strongly influenced by the Sarvodaya movement, where she worked for a year studying Buddhist community organizing that significantly influenced her theories on power and social change.

Thinking as a Citizen and a Religious Leader

Linus — Wed, 04 Jun 2025 03:19:55 +0000

Interview with Rev. Hidehito Okochi

August 1, 2024

This is an interview with Rev. Hidehito Okochi, the chief abbot of Juko-in and Kenju-in temples and founder of the Rita Citizen Asset Foundation, previously posted in Japanese on the Rita Foundation homepage.

Rev. Okochi has been engaged in “supporting community/civil society activities by utilising the temple’s land and buildings” for over 30 years. Currently, he is working to establish a new public interest foundation to formalise this experience into a more structured social framework. To raise awareness of this initiative, we spoke with him about the experiences and ideas that have guided his work, as well as his plans for the future.

How did you come to combine religious and community/civil society activities?

I was born in 1957 as the eldest son of a priest. I went to Keio University to study politics, and at first I tried to find a job, but I felt uncomfortable with what people in companies said. I thought I could contribute to a peaceful society without any ties or vested interests, so after graduating, I transferred to Taisho University to get my certification as a priest in the Jodo Pure Land sect.

After graduating from Taisho University, I joined the Zenseikyo Foundation & Buddhist Council for Youth and Child Welfare. This is a foundation established with the aim of educating and nurturing young people through Buddhist principles. It supports Buddhist Sunday schools and children’s groups, and I was responsible for training sessions on social issues affecting children. There, I met many Buddhist practitioners engaged in social activities and was inspired by them. Believing in Buddhism means believing in the power of human beings and life. I believe that my philosophy of acting as a Buddhist rather than merely preaching doctrine was formed during that time.

I worked at Zenseikyo for five years, and in 1986, at the invitation of my high school teacher, I became the secretary-general of the Tokyo District Youth Association of the Jodo sect, which had been supporting UNICEF fundraising to support maternal and child health activities in Bhutan (including vaccination and the provision of ORS/oral rehydration solutions). This became the catalyst for my involvement in NGO activities.

What did you think of the aid work for Bhutan?

I believe that my involvement in maternal and child health care had a significant impact on my subsequent social activities. The idea that “social participation and the advancement of women’s status are as important as advanced medical care in protecting children’s lives” is highly compatible with Buddhist principles. This experience further deepened my understanding of the concept and activities of primary health care (PHC) when I later participated in the activities of SHARE (Services for the Health in Asian ＆ African Regions).

At the same time, UNICEF proposed providing assistance to Cambodia, which was isolated from the world due to civil war at the time, and I was asked to participate in a fact-finding mission to Cambodia as a representative of Tokyo Jodo Youth Association. At that time, the only organisation supporting Cambodia from Japan was the Japan International Volunteer Centre (JVC). Upon returning to Japan, I advocated for the significance of supporting Japanese organisations through the Tokyo Jodo Youth Association, which led to the establishment of a relationship with JVC. Personally, I also began participating in JVC’s activities. This was the catalyst that led me to become involved in citizen activities.

Rev. Okochi stands in front of Juko-in Temple, rebuilt in Tibetan style

How did you come to use the land and buildings owned by the temple as public “assets”?

I became the head priest of Juko-in Temple in Bunkyo Ward in 1983, the year after I graduated from Taisho University and joined Zenseikyo. Given the size of Kenju-in Temple, it was difficult to support myself solely as a priest, so I continued to work part-time at Zenseikyo. My other temple, Juko-in in Edogawa Ward, had even fewer parishioners, and the head priest, my grandfather, originally led the life of a teacher. I began performing religious services there while I was a student at Taisho University. At the time, the temple was entrusted with managing scattered plots of land within the ward that it owned but could not properly maintain. Reorganising these properties became the main focus of my work at Juko-in.

The temple has been working to enable the assets to be utilised independently, right?

When I first began managing Juko-in, it was during the bubble economy of the late 1980s, and I began to think that I wanted to change the way Juko-in was run. I could have made more efficient use of the land and operated the temple through real estate income. However, I wanted to utilise the assets that had been passed down to me for their original purpose of religious activities. Therefore, we took advantage of opportunities, such as the relocation of tenants or the closure of businesses, to sell leasehold rights, purchase freehold rights, or exchange properties, gradually transitioning the temple to a state where it could use the land independently. Among these efforts, a factory that had been renting land ceased operations, so we acquired the first floor (approximately 50 square meters) and a portion of the second floor (approximately 74 square meters) of the Nickheim Funabori Mansion building through an “equivalent exchange” in 1986. This second-floor portion is now the Komatsukawa City Farm.

What is the Komatsukawa City Farm?

It all began in 1990 when we provided our office space to SHARE, which I mentioned earlier. The 74 square metre, Room 204, was divided into an office, a small room at the back, and a large multi-purpose meeting room, with a shower room also provided for local staff. Rather than simply renting out space, we envisioned this as a “farm” where citizens would take the lead in supporting and nurturing activities that drive social change. With this concept in mind, we have named the entire space Komatsunaka Citizen Farm.

What kind of organizations have used Komatsugawa City Farm?

Up to now, Komatsugawa City Farm has been used as an office and activity place for various civil society activities. The following organizations have used the farm so far.

SHARE, an international health cooperative citizens’ association NPO which conducts citizen-oriented health activities.
Yuyusha Edogawa and Yufusha, meaning literally “the house of leisurely walking and leisurely play” as communal workplaces for the mentally disabled.
The Chittagong Hill Tribe Support Association, which provides support for minorities in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh.
Citizens’ Diplomatic Center, whose activities are focused on the rights of indigenous peoples.
Arakawa Clean Aid Forum, a non-profit organization that networks the Arakawa River basin and restores water quality and nature by picking up river litter.
The Edogawa Citizen’s Network for Thinking about Global Warming (ECNG), nicknamed Soku-on Net, which is an NPO working to combat global warming through the promotion of solar power generation and other measures by citizens.
Mirai “Future” Bank, the first civic non-profit organization in Japan to establish a non-profit loan system and provide loans to other NPOs.
Edogawa Children’s Ombudsman, which aims for a civic society that utilizes the principles of the Convention on the Rights of the Child
Julay Ladakh, which considers the future through cultural exchange with the region of Ladakh, India
Children’s Culture and Edogawa Children’s Theatre, an NPO which nurtures children’s autonomy and creativity through artistic experiences.
Jumma Net, which works for conflict resolution and peace promotion in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh.

The concept of the Komatsugawa City Farm has since spread to the entire Edogawa Ward, right?

As mentioned above, Juko-in began to provide Komatsugawa City Farm, as well as other assets owned by Juko-in in Edogawa Ward, to various municipal organizations in the form of land leased, rented, or leased at no cost. Each organization has different conditions and circumstances, and each case has been discussed with me. So the organizations have been able to use the land as they need it, not as Juko-in or I, as the head priest, have decided. The first objective of this project is to systematize the use of social assets from a broader perspective and to build a model that can be continued in the future.

the Hottokan Edo Solar Plant #2

" data-medium-file="https://jneb.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/9b46a-hottokan-photo.png?w=300" data-large-file="https://jneb.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/9b46a-hottokan-photo.png?w=376" />

the Hottokan Edo Solar Plant #2

What organizations are currently utilizing the assets of the temple?

As of July 2024, the following organizations and individuals are utilizing Jukoin’s assets for social purposes:

Hotto-kan: NPO Hotto Community Edogawa is a group of homes for the elderly, community restaurants, and day care services
Matsue House: The Edogawa Children’s Ombudsman and Soku-on Net use this vacant house for activities for children, which is also an off-grid house with energy self-sufficiency, etc.
Tomʼs House: Tom’s residence is a shared house or shelter for those in difficult circumstances
Amida House Kotobuki-kan: NPO Ainai-kai is a group home for 5 persons with intellectual disabilities
Amida House Hikari-kan: NPO Kotonoha Support use the second floor of the same building as an employment transfer support office and consultation room.
Bambino EST: This is a community welfare promotion organization with after-school daycare services for children with disabilities
Satya J1: The Edogawa Ward Peace Action Center and NGO staff residence rents an apartment comparatively inexpensively for community residents and organizations engaged in social activities
Edogawa Citizen Power Plants: Soku-on Net has created solar power generation systems, which are installed at Juko-in temple, the Chuo Parking Lot, Matsue House, and the Hotto-kan
Kotonoha Dormitory: NPO Kotonoha Support is used as a group home for the intellectually disabled

Juko-in, a solar powered green temple community inside Tokyo

" data-medium-file="https://jneb.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/27507-jukoin.jpg?w=215" data-large-file="https://jneb.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/27507-jukoin.jpg?w=389" />

the Juko-in citizens solar plant #1

Has this support for community activities brought about any changes in yourself?

I was originally a member of international cooperation NGOs such as SHARE and JVC, participating in meetings and study sessions, and even travelling to the field. What I found in common was the importance of community participation. Reflecting on this, I wondered how things were in my own community and decided to join Group KIKI. Group KIKI is a citizen group centred in the Edogawa ward, focusing on environmental and peace issues.The main members included Tetsuji Tanaka (promoter of the Forum for Global Solidarity Tax), Yu Tanaka (chairperson of the Mirai Future Bank), Masahiro Sato (representative of the Arakawa Clean Aid Forum), and Yoichi Usui. Group KIKI continued to attract residents with diverse perspectives, and the results of their study sessions were compiled into a book titled Why the National Postal Savings System Is Problematic: Finance and the Global Environment, which also gave rise to the Mirai Future Bank. Yu Yuichi, whom I met through this group, was the person who had the greatest influence on my subsequent civic activities.Through various activities with Group KIKI and its members, I gained a deep sense of trust with fellow members who shared the vision of “civil society” alongside their living circles and activity themes. This experience affirmed my belief that such relationships are essential for cultivating a truly rich, secure, and fulfilling community.

Similarly, have there been any changes in the local community?

In 1998, an organisation centred on Group KIKI and Komatsugawa Citizen Farm called on other civic groups to join them, and the Edogawa NGO University was launched. I think this was a major step forward for the promotion of civil society.This marked a major shift in our activities. The first event was themed the “50th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights”, and featured a lecture by Hideaki Uemura, representative of the Citizens’ Diplomatic Centre for the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and one of the key figures behind the establishment of the Edogawa NGO University. Participating organisations took turns as lecturers, sometimes inviting external speakers, and held study sessions at Komatsugawa Citizen Farm and other facilities within the ward.

The Edogawa NGO University has aimed to form a network of local organisations that share the same vision of being “stakeholders in the community”, even if they differed in their areas of expertise and themes. Concrete results were also achieved, such as the creation of the Edogawa Children’s Ombudsman from a series of study sessions on the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

After a full cycle, each organisation’s activities had developed so much that it became difficult to maintain the network, whose activities had been divided among the organisations. As a result, the Edogawa NGO University suspended its activities in 2010. Although no overall activities have been conducted since then, the Komatsugawa Citizen Farm has served as a base for pioneering activities in various fields, such as environmental issues, children’s rights, citizen finance, and human rights.

Are the achievements of the NGO University are also linked to this project?

Since the establishment of the Edogawa NGO University, activities based on real face-to-face relationships in the Edogawa ward and activities not limited to a specific physical area have been coordinated as necessary. In Buddhist terminology, this is called a “sangha” (a Sanskrit word meaning “group”, “community”, or “union”, which can also be translated as “republic” in English). In another sense, it resembles the concept of “commons”. In this project, we aim to visualise and systematise the existence and development of such a “complete civil society (commons)”, which transcends regional communities and specialised fields.

While supporting local activities, are you are also involved in civic activities as a religious leader?

Through my NGO activities, I have also established connections with religious leaders. In particular, meeting Rev. Tsutomu Shoji—former head of the National Christian Council in Japan and a prominent figure in the religious community who was involved in social activities—had a significant impact on me and taught me many things. Rev. Shoji and Rev. Tetsuen Nakajima (Abbot of Myotsu-ji Temple in Obama City, Fukui Prefecture), along with other pastors and Buddhist priests, were core members of the Inter Faith Forum for the Review of National Nuclear Policy, which transcends religious and denominational boundaries to address nuclear issues. We have engaged in advocacy efforts with government agencies, local governments, and businesses as well as appealing to and admonishing directly bureaucrats and company employees. This experience has allowed me to witness the true nature of religious leaders. I am currently serving as the secretary of the Interfaith Forum in Tokyo.

the Inter Faith Forum for the Review of National Nuclear Policy

As a religious leader, I have felt the significance of engaging in social activities, so in 1993, I joined the AYUS Buddhist International Cooperation Network alongside my seniors Revs. Shigeta Shincho and Fukuda Gyoji and participated in its establishment and activities for seven years. Additionally, as part of the International Network of Engaged Buddhists (INEB), I have collaborated with Buddhist practitioners from various countries. I have also served as a board member of Arigato International, a United Nations NGO established by the Myochi-kai Buddhist denomination to promote activities for children worldwide through religious solidarity. Furthermore, since the end of the Cold War, I have focused on the Palestinian issue as a root cause of the global challenges arising from the escalation of religious and ethnic conflicts. Since visiting the region in 1991, shortly after the Gulf War, I participated in the activities of the NPO Palestine Children’s Campaign and currently serve as its representative director.

As a Buddhist, how do you view your involvement in civic activities?

What I have come to realise by attending INEB conferences overseas is that there is a global discussion about the role of Buddhism and its practical application in promoting peace, human rights, and the environment. In INEB, we engage in activities and solidarity based on the belief that bodhisattva practice, such as generosity (dana)—providing something without expecting anything in return—is the way of life for Buddhists, seeking to alleviate people’s suffering and resolve social problems. In Japan, there is a strong belief that religious leaders should devote themselves to rituals and ceremonies without engaging in secular activities. Furthermore, even when providing support to people facing difficulties, there seems to be a reluctance to delve into the social structures that led to their situation, as this could challenge existing power structures. However, if we engage in charity activities without addressing the root causes of discrimination and poverty, it will only serve to perpetuate discrimination and the structure of inequality. The founder of INEB, Sulak Sivaraksa from Thailand, clearly states that, “Buddhism is about confronting structural violence.” From this perspective, the NGOs and NPOs that delve into the essence of the suffering they have recognised and strive for true liberation and a sustainable society in accordance with correct social awareness and human rights sensibilities are, for me, a true Buddhist “sangha”.

Do you have any final thoughts to share with us?

To further develop the practices we have been pursuing at the temple over the past 30 years into a sustainable system open to the broader community, we are currently working with our friends who have been involved in our activities to establish a public interest incorporated foundation. Through this project, we aim to create a new “good network”—a “community” or “commons”—driven by people with shared aspirations, and to propose it as a model for social practice. We look forward to working with many more of you to realise this new initiative and build a better society. If you are interested, please feel free to contact us.

Creating Regional Ecological Corridors in Northeastern Thailand

Jonathan S Watts — Wed, 02 Sep 2020 23:58:17 +0000

Buddhist Monasteries Addressing the Continued Exploitation of Forests

September 3, 2020

In recent decades, Thailand has been facing the consequences of mass deforestation caused by the expansion of industrial agriculture and commercial lumber. Today, Thailand’s forested areas account for 37% of land surface, ranking lowest in South East Asia. This percentage has been rising, however, since the “Royal Reforestation Project in Honor of King Bhumibol Adulyadej (Rama IX)”* was initiated in 1993, in response to these critical losses of forest cover. This project has put massive land and watershed areas throughout Thailand under governmental protection and management, in order to revive bio-diversity and freshwater reserves, vital to the survival of rural populations and climate change mitigation. Reforestation and conservation have seen a boon [merit] since then as Buddhist groups and individual landowners have actively engaged in reforestation activities.

Since 2012, however, there has been a lack of supervision as the management of these protected forest areas is in the process of being transferred from the Forestry Department to the Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation (DNP). With lack of clear jurisdiction and funding, the responsibilities of these two agencies have become blurred, which—according to the International Network of Engaged Buddhists (INEB) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)—has resulted in the fringes of these protected forest complexes being progressively razed for the use of export-oriented agriculture or other businesses.

Local, Buddhist forest monasteries have tried to prevent such land grabbing and have called for effective governmental surveillance and surveying of the land. INEB and IUCN have supported these efforts and have recently drafted the “Management Framework for Ecological Corridors between Forest Complexes”, which aims at connecting into one ecological corridor separate protected areas, specifically the Phukheio-Namnow and the World Heritage Dong Phayayen-Khao Yai Forest Complexes in the North-East (see brown area on the map). This interconnectedness would improve the resilience and health of the protected forests, allow for better conservation of biodiversity and watersheds, and improve local populations to engage in conservation efforts, in addition to reducing the likelihood of wildlife trafficking. This proposal will be submitted to the DNP within a year as soon as all surveys and data have been collected and analyzed.

In parallel to these agricultural and logging issues, Thailand is facing an energy crisis and looking for ways to meet rising demand. In seeking ways to increase its national production of electricity, green energy has been one direction of development, specifically wind farms. In fact, only 0.2% of Thailand’s land mass holds the best conditions for wind farming, and some of it is reserved for agricultural purposes or protected forest areas. To overcome these barriers, the Agricultural Land Reform Office (Sor Por Kor) of the Thai government has unilaterally allowed both foreign and public/private wind farm companies to use these lands. Despite one court case by a group of local villagers to contest the construction of a wind farm on Sor Por Kor land, other wind farms on such governmental land have continued to develop as they were judged beneficial to local populations. The authority for these actions has been further bolstered by the use of Article 44 by the Thai military junta’s National Council for Peace and Order which allows it to issue orders regardless of existing laws or regulations.

Wind farms [from Huay Bong to the Dong Phayayen-Khao Yai] are growing fast in Thailand’s North East [from Chaiyapoom to Nakorn Ratchasima], where the meteorological conditions are more favorable. It has come to INEB’s attention that some wind farms have been built or are planned to be built close to these protected forest complexes, and questions about the impact of the construction process and continued use of wind turbines on biodiversity have risen. Without proper surveying the effects of wind farming in these areas, reforestation efforts could be nullified, and damage to the vital watershed areas could impair the lifestyles of rural populations. As such, a consideration of the effect of this development is needed. Further, the rationale for their construction on protected land must be questioned. There have been in fact investigations of collusion between Thai governmental workers and wind energy companies.

Ecological Corridor between the World Heritage Phu Khieo – Nam Nao and Dong Phayayen – Khao Yai Forest Complexes which will connect with the permanent forest plot FPT15

These issues highlight the question of not only “what” (clean energy vs. fossil fuels) but also “how” (the development of clean energy to resuscitate the environment and improve the quality of life of people living in these regions vs. to increase corporate revenues and vested government interests while continuing to encourage the mindless waste of energy by an urbanized consumer citizenry). The method of deployment and a holistic environmental design system are key concerns of INEB’s Eco-Temple Community Development Project. Going forward, a coordinated effort is needed to realize the INEB/IUCN plan of connecting together preserved lands into a national forest corridor that is vital to the environmental wholeness of the entire region.

* The “Reforestation Campaign in Commemoration of the Royal Golden Jubilee” is a nature rehabilitation project being implemented to express loyalty and gratitude to King Bhumibol Adulyadej on His 50^th Anniversary Accession to the Throne in 1996. His Majesty’s interest and support to forestry activities and conservation of nature was and still is active and highly appreciated by all. This project was approved by the Cabinet on February 1, 1994, which directed the project to be implemented according to the Royal Advice from Queen Sirikit that urged the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives to devise urgent measures to halt deforestation and rehabilitate watershed areas of the country.

Article prepared by Cedric Boudry

Sources:

- Thai Post: “Illegal Occupation of Land under the Royal Golden Jubilee Project reflects the lack of government’s will to restore forests”, 5 July 2020

- Thai Post: “OAG Starts wind farm ‘collusion’ inquiry”, 27 February 2017. https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/politics/1205381/oag-starts-wind-farm-collusion-inquiry

- Uldrich Eder, “Wind farms and the Sor Por Kor case”, 5 February 2017. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/wind-farms-sor-por-kor-case-dr-ulrich-eder/

- “Section 44 collapses the administrative court judgment Unlock the land lock of the NACC, promoting the energy business” https://ilaw.or.th/node/4585

Fukushima Study Tour: The Real Meaning of Recovery (fukko)

Jonathan S Watts — Sat, 18 Jul 2020 03:07:24 +0000

Fukushima Citizens Raise Voices about Their Ongoing Pain while Building Their Own New Society

10/20-22/2023

In October 2023, the members of the eco-temple network in Japan welcomed fellow member Emilie Parry from the U.S. and a group of 12 international journalists from the Jefferson Fellowship Program of the East-West Center of the University of Hawaii. The tour was divided into 2 main sections with visits to the Kanto and Kansai areas of Japan. The Kanto portion visited the eco-temples of Rev. Hidehito Okochi. The Japan eco-temple group also led the journalists on a four day reality tour of Fukushima to see the lingering effects of the nuclear disaster there. This is the fourth time the group has led such an international tour of Fukushima since 2012.

Interfaith Forum: We are firmly opposed to the discharge of radioactive “ALPS treated water” into the Pacific Ocean! 声明放射能汚染水(｢ALPS処理水｣)海洋放出に断固反対します

Background:

The broad purpose of the Jefferson Fellowships is to enhance public understanding through the news media of cultures, issues and trends in the United States and the Asia Pacific with a special focus on a particular theme. The 2023 Jefferson Fellowships explored a theme of “Inequality in the US and Asia.” An immersive dialogue, travel, and reporting program to Honolulu, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Fukushima, and Kyoto contextualized and compared widening disparities of income, wealth, and opportunity within the United States and Asia. The program enabled journalists to better understand the distributional consequences of technological change, globalization, and market reforms in dominant globalized industrial systems, and emergent models and theories for markets and governance of the twenty-first century and the Anthropocene. From the Fourth Industrial Revolution and the impact of AI (Artificial Intelligence), to New Systems Markets, Climate Smart Markets, and the Great Turning or Sustainable Revolution, this program critically engaged with the liminal and applied spaces where theory and policy meet lived experience, agency and opportunity. The theme also explored how income and wealth inequalities are reinforced by inequitable access to opportunity in such critical areas as food systems, education, healthcare, financing and credit, housing, and infrastructure, and the new models responding to, or further aggravating, disparity. In particular, Japan has long been considered one of the world’s most equitable developed countries due to income and inheritance tax policies that hinder the accumulation of capital over generations as well as social security benefits that significantly raise the net incomes of the country’s low-income citizens. Inequality, however, is on the rise driven by a greying of society; intergenerational, gender, and urban-rural wealth disparities; and the growth of irregular (hiseiki) employment over life-long employment.

The Culture of Silence and Denial in Fukushima and Japan

Local concern has been high since the beginning of the Fukushima disaster in 2011 for the young people of Fukushima who are exponentially more susceptible, the younger they are, to cancer, especially thyroid cancer, from the radiation that permeates the air, water, and soil of the region. Rev. Okochi, his colleagues in the Interfaith Forum for the Review of National Nuclear Policy, and other Buddhist organizations, such as AYUS, were active in the early years of the disaster to provide safe places for young people to escape their local radiated environments (as documented in our two publications of that time). By 2022, these concerns had led to despair in some 300 cases of thyroid gland cancer being diagnosed in young people in Fukushima Prefecture. This figure can be extrapolated to an average of more than 30 people per population of 100,000, which is much higher than the development rate of thyroid cancer of 1.7 people per 100,000 among late teens in neighboring Miyagi Prefecture.(Oiwa, Yuri. “Thyroid cancer diagnosed in 104 young people in Fukushima”. Asahi Shimbun. August 24, 2014.) Today, these residents face the double barrier of the government’s denial of the linkages between such cancer and the fallout from the nuclear disaster as well as the pervasive culture of silencing their voices to maintain the “harmony” and peace of the community. Rev. Okochi and the Interfaith Forum continue their campaign to have these voices heard.

The Voice of Young Plaintiffs Suffering from Thyroid Cancer in Fukushima ・３１１子ども甲状腺がん裁判・提訴集会 311

Ajisai no Kai: The Supporting Group for Patients of Thyroid Cancer

The Supporting Group for Patients of Thyroid Cancer is a group of young persons with thyroid cancer, their families, and supporters based in Koriyama City, Fukushima. Although experts and media consider pediatric thyroid cancer as a mild form of cancer that does not require treatment, this is not always the case. This group supports each other by sharing information in order for the patients to receive better treatment and live a better life as much as possible. This group does the following projects throughout the year:

1) Café gatherings: About every other month, they create the occasion to know each other better, to exchange information, to learn about thyroid cancer, to participate in cooking and pressed flower classes, and so on.

2) Outreach program: They perform home-visits of patients, providing supplies and counseling on the issues faced by the families. For the patients whose illness is severe, they support them to get a second-opinion as well to accompany them to the hospital/ clinic in order for their treatment to be improved.

3) Research and Advocacy: They collect updated information for the treatment and improvement of quality of life (QOL) from academic societies and seminars regarding the thyroid. They also try to enhance the rights of patients through exchanging views and opinions with National Diet members and local diet members.

Mothers Group for Supporting Young People with Thyroid Cancer along with Jefferson Fellows. Rev. Okochi (far left)

The Empty Promise of How Technological Progress Will Solve Our Human Condition

If there is a visual symbol for the nuclear disaster of Fukushima that parallels the one of the Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima, it would be the giant billboard over top the main shopping district of the town of Futaba, located just a few kilometers from the Fukushima #1 reactors. The sign reads “Nuclear Power: Energy for a Bright Future” — a monument to Japan’s “recovery” or “reconstruction” (fukko) from World War II but now to the brokeness of that recovery in a “disconnected society” (mu-en shakai) rife with mental illness, suicide, and environmental disasters.

The famous town billboard in Fukushima that reads, “Nuclear Power: Energy for a Bright Future”, since taken down

Mr. Sumio Konno is from the nearby Tsushima district, also a highly radioactive contaminated area. He was a longtime employee of the nuclear power plants in the region working as a skilled technician, as opposed to the disposable labor force doing hazardous cleanup work. At the time of the disaster, he was working in the Onnagawa nuclear plant with three reactors. Although this plant was located at the very heart of the tsunami, it did not endure a significant accident such as the one at the Fukushima #1 reactor, whose safety conditions were severly neglected. By the time, he could return home, his wife and young children had already evacuated. They are now residing in a temporary house in Fukushima city. His house still remains in Tsushima, but it does not seem that he and his family will ever have a chance to go back there. The Tsushima district is still designated as a difficult to return area, and only 1.6% of the entire town has been cleared for return. This 1.6% of the town was assigned as a Specified Reconstruction and Revitalization Base Area and decontamination efforts were made by the government. However, the rest of the town has not yet been tackled. Mr. Konno’s house probably will be subject to be demolition in the future. He has to choose what to do with this asset.

Mr. Konno led our group to his parents’ house and the home of his ancestors. To be able to enter this area and lead our group, Mr. Konno listed the official purpose to visit his ancestors’ graves– an access once denied. The group had to enter this area and his house wearing protective Tyvek suits. Observing the abandoned remains of the house ransacked by wild animals and especially the family Buddhist altar with pictures of generations of family left on the walls was deeply sobering and one of the most impactful moments of our tour. Needless to say, Mr. Konno no longer believes nuclear energy brings any promise for our lives and conducts these tours regularly to educate outsiders of the ongoing reality of Fukushima. When the same term “recovery” or “reconstruction” (fukko) is used to speak of this region, Mr. Konno responds, “That’s the last thing I want to hear. These are not words that should be used loosely. Fukko is about things getting back to normal, and then standing up and starting again. There’s no such thing as fukko when you can’t go back to normal and when you can’t rise up again”.

See an earlier interview conducted with Mr. Konno here

former nuclear plant technician Mr. Konno at his family home, now condemned

Shine Coast Farm ad campaign

Mr. Konno also led us on a tour of the Tanashio Industrial Zone, 10 kms north of the stricken reactors. This zone is part of the Fukushima Innovation Coast Framework, which is a national project that aims to restore the industry lost this area and build a new industrial base in the area. It is filled with mega-solar, hydrogen fuel technology and robot test project sites — what appears as another attempt at the promise of a “bright future” with the wonders of technology. Perhaps the most bizarre site in the area was the building of a dairy farm between this site and the stricken reactors. The possibility of dairy cows ingestion radiation and transmitting it to humans through their milk is a fairly well established fact. The audacity to try to convince and sell to citizens milk farmed from a region next to the second largest nuclear accident in human history boggles the mind.

Mr. Konno explains about the new government Tanashio Industrial Zone with dairy farm 5-10 kms from the crippled reactors

Competing Narratives of History

One of the fundamental problems that still exists in Fukushima are the different narratives on how life has unfolded since the disaster. As we have seen above, the central government is very focused on following its tradition of massive industrial projects as a barometer of the well being of the nation and its citizens. On our next stop, we visited the Great East Japan Earthquake and Nuclear Disaster Memorial Museum, which presents a narrative created by the Fukushima Prefectural government. There is quite an amount of critical information in the museum, specifically portraying l the accident as a man-made one due to the negligence of the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) and the central government. However, the prefectural government’s message also has a level of denial due to its desperate hope for reviving the region. Thus, a voice of bravery, energy, and optimism (core Japanese cultural values) permeates the museum with constant reference to “recovery” and “reconstruction” (fukko). In this way, one of the glaring omissions of this museum is proper information on the ongoing health menace of localized radiation and the rates of cancer of young people in the region.

Mr. Konno at the Fukushima Prefecture 3/11 Museum next to bags used to store radioactive soil from decontamination work

A third narrative is found in the efforts of Mr. Konno and others, such as at Our Disaster Memorial Museum. This is a museum created by photo journalists and community people who wanted to deliver their experiences, messages and lessons from the earthquake and nuclear disaster. The word moyai is the theme of this museum, which means the strong ties among people. One supposes that real “recovery” and “reconstruction” (fukko) cannot begin until at least the latter two voices of prefectural government and local citizens are reconciled, and better yet all three voices including outside national interests are reconciled.

Our Disaster Memorial Museum shows an image of the animals left to starve after the disaster

ARTICLE: The Unsurpassed Wisdom of Enlightenment and the Right to Life of Cattle – Takumi Sakamoto

Press Group at Our Disaster Memorial Museum

Resiliency & the Building of Alternative Society among Fukushima Residents

Futabaya Ryokan (traditional inn):

Our last night in Fukushima was spent at the Futabaya Ryokan. According to Ms. Tomoko Kobayashi, who is its host, they had to evacuate after the earthquake in 2011. The tsunami reached the front door of the inn. However, after one year from the earthquake when people were allowed to go in the area only during the daytime due to the radiation, she started to prepare to reopen the inn. It took two years for restoration. She is interested in restoration of the community as well and the inn serves as hub for people coming in and out of the area concerned with the issue. During our time there, we learned of a citizens project to publish a book detailing the true extent of radiation from nuclear power plans around the entire country. Performing incomplete surveys of the extent of radiation, especially in Fukushima, is one of the many way the government avoids responsibility for this issue and tries to perpetuate the “myth of safety” around nuclear power. Various citizens groups are working hard to present a different picture of the reality.

Nihonmatsu Eino Solar Co. Ltd./ Sunshine Co. Ltd 株式会社二本松営農ソーラー/株式会社Sunshine

Nihonmatsu Eino Solar Co. Ltd. is a farm-based power generation company operated by three organizations: 1) Gochikan Co. Ltd, which creates local energy sources in Nihonmatsu city in cooperation with various sectors aiming for self-supporting community, local cooperatives, 2) Co-op Miyagi and Co-op Fukushima, and 3) the Institute for Sustainable Energy Policies（ISEP）which is a non-profit (NPO) thinktank to provide basic support. Sunshine Co. Ltd is a corporation qualified to own cropland established to develop this project. Hiring two staff, one of them is a returnee from the nuclear accident, it operates 6 hectares of farmland with a view of Mt. Adatara. They produce renewable energy equivalent to the usage of 618 households (3% of all households in Nihonmatsu city) or 1,855 battery powered vehicles, as well as a plenty of agricultural products such as Shine Muscat grapes. With the realization of a new type of agriculture and land use in the decarbonized era where agricultural production and energy production have a synergistic effect, they seek to develop the next stage of Fukushima.

Mr. Keio Kondo founder of Nihonmatsu Eino Solar (right) with AYUS Director Ms. Mika Edaki (left) and ace translator Mr. Tom Eskildsen (center)

The Society of Organic Farming in Nihonmatsu (Yu-no-ken) was the original organization of Nihonmatsu Eino Solar Co. Ltd/ Sunshine Co. Ltd. In 1978, Yu-No-Ken was established and started to produce organic agricultural products and direct sales to customers. In 2001, it was certified by Organic JAS (Japanese Agricultural Standards) which was established in 2000. In 2006, the Act for the Promotion of Organic Agriculture was enacted, and in those days, Yu-No-Ken’s customers increased.

In 2011, the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident occurred. Serious radiation fell around Nihonmatsu as well, although it was never designated by the government as an evacuation zone. Agricultural products were heavily affected at the beginning. Yu-No-Ken started to measure the radiation levels of their products and sold only those under the level, but it also lost most of its customers. They felt at a loss as to whether they should continue farming. Yu-No-Ken met an NGO based in Tokyo called Alternative People’s Linkage in Asia (APLA). Together they wondered what they could do for the agriculture in Fukushima. So in 2012, they started a series of seminars to think of the future of Fukushima from a variety of aspects, one of which was energy.

In 2013, Yu-No-Ken started to do research on renewable energy. At this time, they were rather against solar panels, because they might involve the deforestation of mountains and produce garbage later on. But in 2014, they visited Germany with support from APLA and the Buddhist NGO AYUS (a member of our eco-temple circle in Japan) to learn about renewable energy projects done by community or agricultural organizations. They increased their interest in biogas energy production using food waste, which could create cyclical agriculture. However, the more they learned about biogas energy production, the more they realized its difficulties. In 2015, they had a chance to visit other farmers who had started agri-voltaics, which sets solar panels above the farm land and produces energy and agricultural products simultaneously. Yu-No-Ken also thought this might be the best way for them to try at first, since they already have land and this style is not so harmful to the environment. Yu-No-Ken, APLA, and AYUS held a kickoff gathering in Tokyo that year and called for the supporters.

By 2016, Yu-No-Ken submitted an application for permission to convert agricultural land into such agri-voltaic land, but it took about one and a half years to be accepted. In 2018, the construction was finished, and Yu-No-Ken’s agri-voltaics started to produce energy. In 2019, Mr. Kei Kondo from Yu-No-Ken established the Nihonmatsu Eino Solar Co. Ltd. and Sunshine Co. Ltd.

Mr. Keio Kondo explains the grape farming and solar system to international journalists

Coordinating Organization: AYUS: Network of Buddhists Volunteers on International Cooperation

Many thanks go to AYUS and its director Ms. Mika Edaki for organizing most of this tour along with Rev. Hidehito Okochi. AYUS is an NGO established by Buddhists priests based on the Buddhist principle of “interbeing”. AYUS raises funds mainly among Buddhists communities to provide NGOs that work on human rights issues, humanitarian aid in disaster areas, and so on, especially for those who are left behind by mainstream aid projects and funding. As for the people and communities affected by the Great East Japan Earthquake, at the beginning, AYUS cooperated with NGOs, starting their humanitarian assistance in Iwate, Miyagi, and Fukushima prefectures. After a half year, it found that Fukushima had received the least funds and assistance among three due to the nuclear power plant accident. As such, AYUS has mainly cooperated with NGOs working in Fukushima as well as organizing retreat camps for children living under the influence of radioactivity.

Building a Temple Community for Environmental and Social Change

Jonathan S Watts — Tue, 06 Nov 2018 01:46:08 +0000

Shift the Power

by Jonathan S. Watts[1]

November 10, 2018

Here you can find a 2024 interview with Rev. Okochi about his work as well as his journey as a religious leader and engaged citizen.

He has helped develop a micro-credit “Future Bank”, constructed temples and houses to last 100 years, and is working for a nuclear free Japan to “recover hope within 300 years”. Needless to say, Rev. Hidehito Okochi is a forward-looking Japanese Buddhist priest who has been ahead of the times for years. However, with the tsunami disaster of March 11, 2011 and the ongoing Fukushima nuclear reactor crisis, his time has arrived. Rev. Okochi has been a socially engaged Buddhist from his teens as a student activist and his 20s helping establish a Japanese Buddhist NGO for overseas aid work. What has differentiated him from most other engaged Buddhists in Japan up to this time has been his commitment to go beyond the emergency aid activities of social welfare and get into the structural and cultural roots of social transformation. Working to transform his own community as much as engaging in overseas work, his agenda has often been too radical for most other Japanese Buddhist priests to understand or to join in. Yet this agenda is now extremely timely with the political struggle over the future of the country’s energy policy as well as its military policy amidst the present constitutional crisis. These urgent issues flow right into Rev. Okochi’s long held analysis of Japanese society and his vision for reforming society based on Buddhist values.

Rev. Okochi at his Juko-in Solar Temple

A Buddhist Path to Structural Change

Rev. Okochi, like most Japanese priests, was born in a temple and raised to succeed his father as abbot. However, instead of entering the Buddhist Studies department of the university affiliated with his Jodo Pure Land denomination, Taisho University, he entered the Law and Political Science Department of the prestigious Keio University. Growing up in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Rev. Okochi was strongly influenced by the Japanese student political movement of the era; a movement that is for the most part dead today. Still, his ties to his family temple and his subsequent ordination as a priest, led him to search for the common points in his socio-political interests and his Buddhist path. He says, “Eventually I made the connection between the student movement ideals for political peace with Buddhist values for peace and social justice, like no poverty and no discrimination. I also eventually saw how environment was connected to peace, and how I could work for society as a priest.”

In his 20s, he and a group of other like-minded Buddhist priests took several trips abroad to various regions of conflict, especially war-torn Indo-China. These intimate encounters with the suffering of humanity led them to create AYUS, a Japanese Buddhist NGO focused on supporting small NGOs doing aid work in these areas. At this time, other Japanese Buddhist priests were developing similar concerns and a group of successful, overseas aid Buddhist NGOs sprouted up and continue their work today.[2]

However, these initiatives were not enough to satisfy Rev. Okochi’s political sensibilities for social justice. Reflecting on the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths, Rev. Okochi went deeper into the nature of the suffering that he had encountered overseas:

When Shakyamuni Buddha gained enlightenment, his first teaching was the Four Noble Truths, that is: first, get a solid grasp of the suffering (the problem); second, ascertain its causes and structure; third, form an image of the world to be aimed for; and fourth, act according to correct practices. From this, one gains a sense of the meaning of life in modern society as a citizen with responsibilities in the irreversible course of time. The suffering of the southern peoples and nature, from which we Japanese derive support for our lives even as we exploit it, has caused the Edogawa Citizens Network for Thinking about Global Warming (ECNG) to think, and therefore we have achieved concrete results. The problem is structural in nature, so by changing the system and creating measures for improvement, we achieve results. The first thing is to fulfill our responsibilities to the people around us and to future generations.[3]

Rev. Okochi discovered that the Japanese economic prosperity of the 1970s and 80s was built on the back of the economic and environmental exploitation of both the rural communities in Japan and the nations of Southeast Asia, while piggy backing on the political exploitation of the United States in the Middle East. While other Buddhist priests of his generation may have also seen this Second Noble Truth, almost all have been content in working on the First Noble Truth of immediate suffering through social welfare and aid work overseas. Rev. Okochi has been a pioneer in the Buddhist world of Japan for not only engaging in activist and advocacy campaigns on these issues within Japan—such as his leadership of the Palestinian Children’s Campaign—but also for working in his own community to end the complicity with this overseas exploitation rooted in Japanese consumeristic lifestyles.

The critical consciousness developed in understanding the global system of economic, environmental, and political exploitation from engaging in the Second Noble Truth led Rev. Okochi to the Third Noble Truth. His endeavor to create a future vision of Japan comes from his own Buddhist ideals and values. He has drawn heavily on the founder of his Jodo Pure Land denomination, Honen (1133-1212). Honen was the first of the generation of Kamakura Era Buddhist reformers who created a spiritual and social revolution by bringing Japanese Buddhism down to the masses. His teaching of a faith based in the vow of Amida Buddha to abandon no sentient being no matter how deep their transgressions and defilements made salvation and enlightenment possible for anyone, while empowering the common people with a sense of their own social rights and agency.[4] For Rev. Okochi, this means creating a world without discrimination and exploitation, especially one without a military and nuclear presence. This belief led Rev. Okochi to join a group of farsighted Japanese religious leaders to form the Interfaith Forum for the Review of National Nuclear Policy in 1993.

The second aspect of this vision derived from Honen is nurturing community based on trusting relationships and self-reliance. This was an endeavor he set about working on in his urban temple community in Tokyo through supporting and hosting a wide variety of NGOs in a building owned by his Juko-in temple. In one large office space are found:

a children-at-risk support group
an indigenous Japanese peoples’ (Ainu) advocacy group
an environmental group for keeping the nearby Arakawa River and its environs clean
a small political party with numerous women candidates
an alternative energy and culture NGO supporting the peoples of northern India called Julay Ladakh
a local credit union called the Mirai (“Future”) Bank
the aforementioned Edogawa Citizen’s Network for Thinking about Global Warming (ECNG).

These are further integrated with a host of other citizens groups located in the area in what is called the Edogawa Lifestyle Network. In this way, Rev. Okochi has sought to connect the people in his neighborhood together on important local issues and then connect them to peoples with similar concerns in other parts of the world towards building “global community”.

Shift the Power: Transforming Japan’s Energy System

1) Building a Citizen’s Power Plant at Juko-in Temple

ECNG is an important lynchpin for the wide swath of Rev. Okochi’s efforts. It was established in the summer of 1996 in the run-up to the Third Session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP3) held in Kyoto in December 1997, resulting in the well-known Kyoto Protocol on greenhouse gas emissions. ECNG members started learning about global warming by first engaging in the recovery of CFCs in their local ward, which is responsible for a high level of such emissions in the central Tokyo 23 ward area due to the concentration of car demolition businesses there. This project led into a deeper investigation of Japan’s industrial grid and the generation of electricity. Rev. Okochi explains:

In those days, there had already been various environmental activities carried out in Japan, but the focus tended to be on just personal restraint or frugality by individual effort. Sometimes these activities missed the mark and were not very effective in addressing the problems. In this way, the environmental movements were taken advantage of because they distracted people from the structural causes. Sometimes they became the subject of mockery for being nonsensical, and environmental activists tended to be looked at with disdain. We did not want that to happen in our work. We wanted to find a way forward that is truly rational and would really be effective in eliminating the suffering. This was the basic starting point of our activities. We considered that the first issue to tackle is the emission of CO2 and other greenhouse gases. We then considered where these emissions come from, and it became clear that they come especially from coal and other thermo-powered electrical generation. There is also the problem of the huge industries that make significant amounts of money while emitting greenhouse gases.

As a Buddhist priest, Rev. Okochi was cognizant about how their deepening analysis was flowing along the lines of the Four Noble Truths. Yet he never directly articulated this to the mostly non-Buddhist activists in the group, allowing it to naturally unfold as with all Dharma—a term meaning both the Buddha’s teaching and the way of nature or natural law.

In terms of the Four Noble Truths, we paid attention to the First Noble Truth (dukkha) of suffering as expressed in the environmental destruction and collapse of rural communities in Japan triggered through the production of dams and nuclear power plants. We considered what our relationship as citizens living in an urban area was to this suffering. Then, we considered the Second Noble Truth (samudaya) of the different factors that come together to create this suffering, such as: the construction companies and electric companies who wanting to proceed with multi-billion-dollar projects at any cost; local regions dependent on economic subsidies to host these projects; the politicians who use large amounts of political funding enticed by incentives of several percent to support these projects; and the myopic lifestyles of consumers especially in urban areas. Looking more deeply into social structures, we discovered the stilted pricing system of electricity, an issue that strikes at the heart of our whole economic development policy. Finally, we tried to think about the Third (nirodha) and Fourth Noble Truths (magga), which is the way to envision and to alleviate or end the suffering. We wanted to come up with an alternative way of being and living where we would be able to be fully responsible for our actions and not be negligent or ignore the suffering created by our actions. Therefore, ECNG made it a goal not only to reduce peak electricity demand and change policy in order to promote the spread of alternative forms of energy, but also to familiarize people with the concept of energy and get communities involved in initiatives. The first test of this was the establishment of the citizens’ power plant using solar electrical generation.

The site for this “plant” was none other than Rev. Okochi’s Juko-in temple. At the time, the 400-year old temple also required a complete rebuilding, so Rev. Okochi used this opportunity to design a most unusual temple by Japanese Buddhist standards. Borrowing heavily on Tibetan Buddhist temple design, the new temple contains a number of ecological features. The main Buddha Hall was built on the second floor to maximize sunlight and air circulation and to better adjust the room temperature through Japan’s four seasons so as to cut down on heating and cooling costs. The first floor was designed without traditional Japanese tatami mats to encourage easier access without taking off shoes and to make it easier to create various community activities and events.[5]

The new temple style also has a long flat roof, instead of a steep angled roof as with most traditional Japanese Buddhist temples. This design made easier the installation of two sets of fifteen solar panels with an output of 5.4 kW in 1999. It is estimated that 3 kW is enough to meet the needs for the activities of a family of four, so the “power plant” produces a little less than twice this amount. Rev. Okochi explains that the point of this initiative was not to try to start building an alternative form of large-scale electrical generation but rather, in the spirit of Honen, to act as a replicable model to empower individual homes to develop sustainable electrical independence. He further explains:

In those days, it used to cost around 3 million yen ($27,000) just to install enough solar panels for a single household, which now costs half to a third the price. Such projects were very expensive, so we developed the idea to collect donations from enough people to be able to jointly run a solar power generation facility. 50,000 to 100,000 yen ($500-$1,000) per person was the average of the donation for a stake in the project. We tried to collect from a broad range of people in our community, not just environmental activists in ECNG. We also made a mechanism where we would eventually get paid back through selling the power we generated. The ultimate purpose was not for ECNG to make big money by selling electricity. Rather, we wanted to show that there was support for renewable, clean energy in society and that they are people who were willing to share the burden for the future of the planet. We also wanted to make this possible for an average citizen to be a part of and not only by people who could afford to make a large investment for solar panels on their roof. There are other people who live in condominiums or apartments who are not able to install solar panels but also want to support this movement. The most important thing is developing new mechanisms or institutions in society by oneself within a community. Solar power generation is not a self-standing project. You could consider it as part of a larger package, because I place great emphasis on how to connect this project with other activities in different fields.

2) Creating Community Financing Systems for Clean Energy

In this way, Rev. Okochi and ECNG developed another mechanism to raise awareness and increase community participation in financing the 6 million yen cost of installing these panels. The financing involved a multi-level scheme: 1) grants from government foundations and NGOs paid for around 2.7 million yen; 2) Juko-in Temple funded another 1.5 million yen by prepaying 10 years worth of its electric bills as if it did not have its own source of electricity; and 3) the remaining 1.8 million yen was paid with a loan from a community bank called the Mirai Bank. However, Rev. Okochi explains that if they only relied on the income from the electricity generated by the new panels and sold to Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), it would have taken fifteen years or more to pay off the bank loan, so 4) they created a final financing mechanism called Green Power Certificates.

Rev. Okochi explains that the Mirai Bank (mirai meaning “future” in Japanese) is more of a community bank or an NGO bank than a micro credit bank—although its inspiration came from the micro credit banking systems first developed in Sri Lanka by the well known Buddhist based Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement under A.T. Ariyaratne and made famous by the Grameen Bank and Nobel Peace Prize Winner Muhammad Yunus in Bangladesh. He explains that the bank was created in 1994 by a few dozen depositors who had collected a few million yen worth of money, himself being one of those early investors. These early investors and a few other Japanese felt concerned about having their savings and investments in Japan’s huge corporate banks or in the giant, governmental run Postal Savings (Yūcho) Bank. The money from these banks has ended up financing many kinds of destructive projects—such as nuclear power plants within Japan or huge development projects overseas like investment in coal mining[6] or arms trade[7]—which are creating a negative legacy for future generations. The Mirai Bank promised to use the investments or deposits only for projects that are good for the environment or beneficial for people in the future. Originally, the Mirai Bank was not necessarily positioned as being a local community initiative in Okochi’s district of Edogawa. On the other hand, its intention was not created to expand all over Japan and collect large amounts of capital either. Rather, it was supposed to be an initiative that would lead to more, similar local initiatives of making alternative banks. There were not that many community bank initiatives in Japan at that time, so by 1999 the capital had increased quite a bit to several hundred million yen as the number of depositors from all over Japan increased rapidly.[8] In this way, the ECNG solar power generation project was considered to be a project worthy for getting a loan from Mirai Bank.

Then, they created Green Power Certificates to not only speed up the process of paying back this loan but to further engage the community. Rev. Okochi explains that in Europe and other places, there are regions that stipulate the obligation to buy natural energy at a higher price than that of energy generated by normal means (fossil, large hydro, nuclear). There are also green power systems, which designate power produced by consumers using clean generation methods and purchase it at higher prices. In those days, Germany had a feed-in tariff system to support the development of renewables in which such electricity was sold at roughly 55 yen per kWh. The ultimate justification for the higher price was that natural or renewable energy does not leave any burden to future generations in the form of nuclear accidents or nuclear waste or other such environmental destruction. In other words, he explains, you are paying all the costs upfront rather than forcing the people of future generations to bear the burden. What ECNG then did was to subtract the price TEPCO bought electricity from Juko-in (22 yen per kWh) from this theoretical price of the natural energy (55 yen per kWh) to arrive at the price for selling their Green Power Certificates (33 yen per kWh). The Juko-in solar panels generate roughly 6,000 kWh a year, so at 33 Yen per kWh, they determined that they were generating the equivalent of 198,000 yen in clean, solar energy. They then sold 200 Green Power Certificates for 1,000 yen each (roughly 30 kWh per certificate), totaling 200,000 yen, to match this amount in clean energy generation and help pay back the loan more quickly.

To better understand the depth of this mechanism, Rev. Okochi explains that at that time, the Japanese power sector had not been de-regulated, so households had no choice but to buy electricity from TEPCO—which not coincidentally owns and runs the Fukushima nuclear reactors. When one buys or uses TEPCO’s electricity, one does not know where it is coming from, because TEPCO has stakes in all types of energy: oil, coal, gas, nuclear, even renewable. This includes the electricity from the roof of Juko-in that cannot be sold directly to the community but has to be sold back to TEPCO. The 6,000 kWh that Juko-in generates per year goes into the TEPCO grid, gets lumped together with many other sources of electricity, and then goes out to everyone in some very tiny percentage. By purchasing a Green Power Certificate at 33 yen per kWh, ECNG’s supporters are “investing” in or promoting clean energy by supporting the development of Juko-in’s and other such community power stations, and in theory, if not actuality, getting some of that clean energy back from TEPCO through Juko-in’s contribution to the larger TEPCO grid. This mechanism that ECNG created was a precursor to the feed-in tariff system in Japan and the scheme that become more common since 2011 and is currently being used now between the new independent power producers and consumers. However, Rev. Okochi emphasizes, “It’s very important to understand this point that we were not asking them just to pay this additional amount, because renewable energies are more costly. It would be really negative if we were actually planting the idea into people’s minds that renewable energy is much more expensive. What we were really asking was to pay upfront costs that would be otherwise transferred to future generations in the destruction of our environment by investing in a change to the present system of structural violence.[9]

Yet a final mechanism of this scheme was a local currency called Edogawatt, in which three 10 unit Edogawatt bills were given with each Green Power Certificate to use in exchange for baby-sitting, carrying loads, translating, and other small jobs within the community. Rev. Okochi explains that the bills acted like coupons and were an experiment as “an incentive for the creation of a mutual aid society within the community and a tool for deepening interpersonal relationships and trust.”^[5] The idea was to create a model of accumulating their own assets or capital. This local capital would be circulated within their own community, creating more and more value locally, rather than leaking outside the community—which happens so often now when large chain stores and businesses open up in local communities. The electricity and profits that were generated from the power plant served as a backing for the value of this local currency, like in the past when currencies used to have backing in terms of gold. As they have been able to fully pay back their loans, they have stopped selling the Green Power Certificates and discontinued the Edogawatt currency.

the Hottokan Edo Solar Plant #2

Finally, in 2009, the Hatoyama administration raised the buy-back price for such renewable electricity from 28 to 48 yen per kWh.[10] This greatly improved the profits from the solar panels on the Juko-in roof, so that they were able to invest in installing another 10.58 kW on the roof in 2012. In 2007, ECNG also installed 3kW of used panels on the roof of a nearby elderly home, which were then completely upgraded in 2013 with a new set of panels totaling 11.52 kW. ECNG now dubs these two facilities as the Juko-in Edo Solar Plant #1 and the Hottokan Edo Solar Plant #2. According to ECNG[11], the Juko-in panels cost a total of 5 million yen ($45,000) paid from 43 separate investors, averaging about $1,000 per investor. The Hottokan panels cost 4 million yen ($35,000) with 33 investors, again at about an average of $1,000 per investor. The Juko-in Plant’s generation averages around 11,500 kWh per year, which at a rate of 42/kWh[12] creates 483,000 yen annually ($4,200) in profits. The Hottokan Plant’s generation is slightly higher at around 15,200 kWh per year, which at a rate of 38 per kWh creates 577,600 yen annually ($5,100) in profits. These profits support a variety of activities by ECNG, such as general educational activities, supporting another local temple to install solar panels on their roof, and supporting a special house for children-at-risk in the community. This house runs on used solar panels and recycled golf cart batteries so that it is completely off grid. As the work continues to expand, ECNG announces in February 2017 that the Edo Solar Plant #3 had begun producing power. Located in a parking lot owned by Juko-in temple near Hottokan, its set of 28.8 kW panels is ECNG’s largest initiative yet.

3) Reducing Consumption as well as Shifting Production

Amazingly the work does not stop here. As Rev. Okochi previously noted, the community power station is just part of a larger structural and cultural shift to which ECNG and Rev. Okochi are committed. Rev. Okochi explains that when they installed the solar panels at Juko-in, one of the goals was to reduce CO2 emissions. Another of the goals was to reduce peak energy demand, an issue that strikes deep at the system of providing mass, centralized electricity. At ECNG, they continued to dig deeper into all the reasons for Japan’s massive use of energy from the standpoints of both consumers’ daily lives as well as the different institutions and mechanisms in society, especially the big companies. They found studies that showed from 1965 to 1995 the gap between generated electricity used and lost due to various system inefficiencies in Japan had widened by 170%.[13] One of the important causes of this was the increased use of nuclear reactors. Because of the limits of the technology, nuclear reactors must operate at lower temperatures to ensure the safety of the nuclear fuel rods. This cuts their thermodynamic efficiency down to around 30%—some 10% lower than coal-fired plants, 20% lower than gas turbine plants, and 60% lower than hydropower stations.

Another core inefficiency in this process is how the government and big businesses have convinced the public that these giant power systems are needed to guarantee a peak level of consumption, which occurs only in urban areas for a short period of time in the middle of the day, often only in extreme weather, such as the height of summer. These giant power systems are now being seen as increasingly outdated, because they cannot respond to fluctuating demands. Nuclear power is a prime example, because the power it produces is constant and cannot be regulated except by shutting down the entire operation. While renewable energies have been criticized for not being able to provide constant peak supply, they are much more flexible. Further, solar panels generate the most electricity when the sun is at its height and is the hottest, thereby making it a great way to address peak energy needs. Solar power thus reduces the need to construct a large number of dams and nuclear power plants.[14] (For more details on these issues, see Okochi’s article “Deconstructing the Myths of Nuclear Energy“)

While the community power station is important for creating new environmentally friendly forms of energy production, energy reduction is also essential for reducing peak demand and weakening the forces that legitimize the production of a mass centralized power system. In this way, ECNG engaged in a consumer campaign to decrease the amount of electricity used through the purchase of more energy efficient, electrical appliances. The energy efficiency of key household appliances, especially air conditioner-heaters and refrigerators, has improved drastically over the last decade. Thus ECNG started another project to support local residents to replace their outdated, energy inefficient appliances, especially owned by the elderly in the working class neighborhoods around Juko-in. This project was funded by another community bank, called the AP Bank (for “alternative power”), which was started in 2003 by a musician named Kazutoshi Sakurai of the popular band Mr. Children. In the end, they discovered that with almost a tenth of the amount spent on the solar panels on the roof on Juko-in, they could save 2,000 kWh more than these panels could generate in a year by updating such appliances and products. In this way, through both generating their own electricity and saving on the electricity they do use, Juko-in temple has become a successful model for realizing the final vision of every home becoming totally energy self-sufficient and of a movement to unplug from centralized electrical grids.

Rebuilding Local Resources, Local Ecology, and Local Community

temple entrance with anti-war & anti-nuke banner

In his emphasis on connecting projects with other activities in different fields, Rev. Okochi has developed another set of environmental and systemic activities at a second temple he presides over, called Kenju-in, in central Tokyo. In his first experiences in Southeast Asia and through a study tour of Sarawak, Malaysia with ECNG, he came to learn of large Japanese companies, like Mitsubishi, that engage in destructive logging practices, while local timber companies within Japan have gone out of business. Not only has this been destroying the forests of Southeast Asia, but the abandoned mono-culture forests planted in previous years by local companies within Japan are now causing soil erosion, landslides, and a host of local environmental problems—yet another example of large development projects that sacrifice the environment and well being of people in rural areas and future generations for the convenience of urban consumers.

The negative effects, however, are also passed onto urban dwellers. Most houses that are built today by major contractors in Japan use inferior wood from fast growth, monoculture forests. In their construction, heavy amounts of chemical adhesives and finishings are used leading to the phenomenon known as “sick houses” for the respiratory, skin, and other problems they cause new inhabitants. The entire structure may last only one generation, leaving the family with nothing to pass on to future generations while creating greater profit for the construction companies through planned obsolescence.

Kenju-in apartments with an outer wall of burnt cedar for non-chemical, external insulation

The vision Rev. Okochi and his partners developed to confront this problem is part of the increasingly well-known Japanese sato-yama (village-mountain) policy for developing sustainable human communities living in co-existence with forests as well as marine environments (sato-umi). As with Juko-in temple, Rev. Okochi was faced with rebuilding Kenju-in Temple. He decided to work with an ecological building company to not only rebuild the temple but reduce its size so that a set of apartments could be included. The building company is working with local lumber companies and marginalized, traditional Japanese architects and carpenters to plant a variety of hardwoods that will enrich biological diversity, avoid soil erosion, and provide a sustainable supply of timber for construction use. The houses they build are not only completely free of chemicals but are built to last up to 300 years. In his ongoing attempts to rebuild urban community, the apartments have been bought by a variety of people with concerns for healthy lifestyles, such as people with allergies and families with small children. As with so many of his other projects, this one has spawned another initiative, a small, completely chemical free, share house for people with special disabilities established in 2017 in the area of Juko-in temple.

Shift the Power: Educate, Agitate, Organize[15]

All these initiatives are part of Rev. Okochi’s ultimate vision of “working with civic groups and building a Pure Land without a nuclear and military presence”. While the Japanese government, like many other governments, has used the promise of nuclear power to distance itself from oil dependency and fulfill targets to reducing green house gas emissions, nuclear power has actually been a means to reinforce a top down social order that ensures the profits of electric companies and construction companies, exploits laborers in the plants,[16] and robs communities in remote regions of their independence while endangering their future. Rev. Okochi’s notes that his vision of and practices towards a natural energy society would “reverse the social hierarchy” by decentralizing the production and consumption of energy and empowering localities and individuals to better determine their own futures.

Since the triple disaster of March 11, Rev. Okochi’s Inter Faith Forum for the Review of National Nuclear Policy has been busy offering their churches, temples, and other facilities as shelters for families who want to evacuate the areas around the Fukushima nuclear power plant. They have also continued their advocacy work hosting public events in key regional areas where the government is attempting to restart nuclear power plants. Hoisting a banner reading “Longing for the Pure Land; No Nukes, No Arms; Taking Refuge in Amida Buddha”, Rev. Okochi was one of the few Buddhist or religious figures found at the anti-nuclear protests that frequently occurred in Tokyo for the first years after the Fukushima disaster began. Since 2012, he has also begun working with the International Network of Engaged Buddhists (INEB) to run international study tours of the Fukushima region for religious, social activists in Asia to learn of the problems of nuclear energy development that is threatening their own countries. These connections have given birth the Eco-Temple Community Development Project under INEB, which links like-minded Buddhist temples in Asia to further develop and share know-how in building eco-temple communities like Juko-in and Kenju-in.[17]

Still, there is much work to be done in Japan to raise a new generation of ecologically minded citizens with an understanding of the 2^nd Noble Truth of the structural and cultural causes of suffering. In June 2011, shortly after the Fukushima nuclear accident, Rev. Okochi participated in a screening of Helena Norberg-Hodge’s film The Economics of Happiness at his alma mater Keio University. He was struck by the political apathy to these issues, especially the nuclear one, by these students of one of Japan’s top universities. He feels that today’s young “educated” Japanese seem more ignorant than apathetic about important social issues. They are so consumed by their own career paths and by social media that they do not seem to have time for being concerned about critical social issues. Motivated to take action as always, Rev. Okochi has also gotten involved in a new initiative called the Social Justice Fund. Founded in November of 2011 as the country was in the midst of learning about the corruption behind the Fukushima disaster, the Fund holds interactive seminars for citizens to learn about social issues, often hosted at the town hall near Kenju-in temple. For a nation long known for social conformity and trust in government and big business, this development of critical public opinion, especially since Fukushima, is significant. Unwilling to stay ignorant to the Second Noble Truth, Rev. Okochi has been building a future in Japan that may hopefully be arriving sooner than expected.

NOTES

[1] This article is a significantly edited and expanded version of an earlier article called “A Futuristic Priest whose Time Has Arrived”, published in This Precious Life: Buddhist Tsunami Relief and Anti-Nuclear Activism in Post 3-11 Japan (Yokohama: International Buddhist Exchange Center, 2012). Many of the quotes and comments by Okochi come from an updated interview with him at his Kenju-in Temple on September 12, 2017 with Tom Eskildsen acting as interpreter.

[2] Watts, Jonathan S. “A Brief Overview of Buddhist NGOs in Japan”. Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 31 (2): 417–28, 2004.

[3] Okochi, Hidehito. “The Citizen’s Strategy for Creating a New World: The Future Starts with Us”. New Internationalist Japan. No. 30, Jan-Feb. 2002. http://www.ni-japan.com/webold/jbody342.htm. Also on the Juko-in homepage: http://www.juko-in.or.jp/Eactivity.htm#sokuon

[4] For more on Honen’s teaching as a kind of Buddhist Liberation Theology, see Machida, Soho. Renegade Monk: Honen and Japanese Pure Land Buddhism (University of California Press, 1999).

[5] On the specifics of funding the temple rebuild, Rev. Okochi notes: “Originally, Juko-in did not have what you could really call a proper temple building, so I had to develop a separate project for this reconstruction. The temple was rebuilt by reorganizing the cemetery to make enough space for an additional 250 tombs. In Tokyo, there is a great demand for burial lots, because the population is so dense and the land is not enough. From the money collected by providing additional cemetery facilities, I was able to finance the temple reconstruction. In previous times, a temple was generally rebuilt from accumulating the donations of the temple members over many years. Before World War II, Juko-in had a number of more affluent temple members who made large donations to help rebuild the temple, but after the war, due to demographic and economic changes to this area, our membership declined to only 20 or so households, who were not affluent. I think it is a unique feature of Japanese temples that they rely on their cemeteries for a large part of their income. People visit the temple not so much out of faith in Buddhism as out of a desire to venerate their ancestors.”

[6] “The top two lenders to coal plant developers since January 2014 were Japanese banks, Mizuho Financial and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial, providing $11.5bn and $10.2bn respectively.” Madison Marriage. “Banks criticised for funding coal deals despite Paris agreement.” The Financial Times. December 11, 2017.

[7] Some of Japan’s most prominent financial institutions—such as Mitsubishi UFJ Financial, Dai-Ichi Life Insurance Company, Mizuho Financial, and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial—are involved in funding organizations that make cluster munitions. “Worldwide Investments in Cluster Munitions: A Shared Responsibility”. PAX, the Netherlands. June 2016 update.

[8] As of March 2018, the bank has 441 investors with 152 million yen ($1.35 million) in initial investment, 1.21 billion yen ($10.7 million) in cumulative lending, and 40 million yen ($355,000) in outstanding loans. http://www.geocities.jp/mirai_bank/

[9] “Feed-in Tariffs in Japan: Five Years of Achievements and Future Challenges”. Kimura, Keiji. Renewable Energy Institute. September 2017.

[10] “Japan was a world leader in solar energy but has been overtaken by Germany after the LDP government terminated its financial subsidies to households to install solar panels. This subsidy programme to install solar panels began in fiscal 1994 and ended in fiscal 2005 and the solar market has since contracted by 15 percent each year. However, the programme was reintroduced in January 2009…Under the new DPJ government, utilities are obliged to buy back excess energy from households generated by renewable sources, including solar and wind. To encourage more households to install solar panels, the buy-back price will be raised from 28 to 48 yen per kilowatt in this feed-in tariff system.” Lam, Peng Er. “The Hatoyama Administration and Japan’s Climate Change Initiatives”, East Asian Policy Volume 2, Number 1, Jan/Mar 2010.

[11] https://www.sokuon-net.org/市民立発電所/

[12] On June 18, 2012, a new feed-in tariff was approved of 42 yen/kWh for solar power generators over 10 kW with a declining scale that has dropped gradually to 32 yen/kWh in 2014, 21 yen/kWh in 2017, and 18 yen/kWh in 2018. The rate stays stable for 20 years depending on the year the facility is approved and goes on line, so those who got in early on this system like the ECNG plants make significantly better profits over the initial 20 year period.

[13] “Supply and Demand of Energy in Japan”. Citizen’s Nuclear Information Center (Japan).

[14] Rev. Okochi has written elsewhere that, “Studies show that such peak or excess periods only occur from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. on weekdays when the temperature is above 31 degrees celsius, which on average comes to a total of 10 hours out of a total of 8,760 hours in the year. The real issue, therefore, is not the need for more electricity but much more efficient management of it; for example, changing the current pricing system that increases consumption rates for household use while decreasing rates for industrial use during these peak periods.” Okochi, Hidehito. “Deconstructing the Myths of Nuclear Energy and Building a Pure Land without Nuclear or Military Presence”. In Lotus in the Nuclear Sea: Fukushima and the Promise of Buddhism in the Nuclear Age. Ed. Jonathan S. Watts (Yokohama: International Buddhist Exchange Center (IBEC), 2013). pp. 176-77.

[15] “Educate, Agitate, Organize” is a slogan developed by B.R. Ambedkar, the great Indian statesman and Buddhist leader who drafted the constitution of independent India and led the civil rights campaigns for the eradication of untouchability in India.

[16] For an intimate and disturbing portrayal of this situation well before the Fukushima incident, see the 1995 documentary “Nuclear Ginza” by Channel 4 in the United Kingdom. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPD_YeOAJys

[17] Rev. Okochi first presented his work at the 2009 INEB Conference in Chiang Mai, Thailand and has since become active in the local JNEB group in Japan while joining the INEB Advisory Committee in 2016.

Tera Energy: A Buddhist Company

Jonathan S Watts — Sun, 28 Oct 2018 01:39:48 +0000

Building Human Bonds and Community while Taking on the Structural Foundations of Climate Change

Rev. Ryogo Takemoto

Rev. Ryogo Takemoto is the abbot of Saisho-ji, a Jodo Shin Hongan-ji Pure Land denomination temple located in Katsuragi City in Nara Prefecture. In June 2018, he established a new company called Tera Energy (tera=Buddhist temple) based in Kyoto City, which in April of 2019 began selling electricity within Hiroshima prefecture. He is also a representative of the SOTTO Kyoto Self-Death & Suicide Counseling Center and a former member of the Jodo Shin Hongan-ji Research Institute. He was first introduced to INEB work through his suicide prevention activities, but in establishing Tera Energy, he was introduced to Rev. Hidehito Okochi, one of the founder members of the INEB Eco-Temple Project, and has now joined the project. This article was developed from the talk he gave at the 3^rd International Eco-Temple Meeting held at the Deer Park Institute in Himachal Pradesh, India from October 18-19, 2019.

In 2018, a few of my Jodo Shin Pure Land priest friends and I formed a company called Tera Energy. Tera means temple in Japanese. The term tera also reminds us of the Latin word terra which means “earth” and also of the concept of tera as in teravolts. So tera has multiple meanings. Our logo mark has a white lotus in the middle of it representing the Buddha’s enlightenment, and the colors orange and yellow are used to represent the Buddha’s wisdom and compassion. The Tera Energy company was founded by four Japanese Buddhist priests, that’s our main unique point.

Revs. Koyu Tsurono, Ryogo Takemoto, Makoto Honda, Keio Kimoto (left to right)

The reason we formed our company is because we agreed that there are some very important challenges to address. The first is a tendency to consider one’s own life mainly in isolation from others. The second was the climate change or the “climate crisis” as Greta Thunberg refers to it. I believe the basis of these problems is a fundamental tendency in our society to increase suffering, especially in the struggle over wealth. Further, society is always driving us to consume more and more by increasing our desires through advertising. It is a mechanism imbedded in society where a few people try to control the masses in order to increase their own wealth. I think it is a huge problem that the big internet companies like Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple (GAFA) and so forth are trying to control all of the information in the world and use that to control the behavior and minds of everyone in the world. I feel we need to take up the challenge of moving away from a centralized pyramid type of society to a more cyclical and mutual engagement type of society.

Concerning the problem of human isolation these days, we want to enable people to feel a warm connection with others and to create a world in which no one has to feel alienated or alone. Our ultimate goal to achieve this is to develop a community around the Buddhist temples that are found everywhere in Japan so that no one has to feel left out and everyone can feel connected. The temple was the center of such local community for many centuries in Japan in the past. We want to emphasize creating connections in a society in which desire is not the determining factor. Such a society is a place where we can be connected beyond differences in race and religion and where we can also have an economic system that is based on sustainability rather than desire. We are trying to make a mechanism based on Buddhist ethics that is not based on desire, taking what is not given, or conflict over resources but is rather based on a sense of mutual trust and sharing.

When we think about what is happiness and what is meaningful in life, we should think back to the Buddhist teaching that you should be your own light and that the Dharma should be your own light. Many of us are leading lives controlled largely by other people. I think it’s important for us to be able to switch to a life where we take control of our own lives and preferably do so based on Dharma. This is something I especially feel strongly when I am involved in the suicide issue. Many people who are feeling suicidal have been victimized by a society in which they have very little freedom or they are controlled by others from the outside. I think people who get to the point where they consider taking their own lives are actually people who have a more natural sensibility that something is wrong with their lives. It seems to me that these people who are feeling they want to kill themselves may be more normal, and our own society is more insane. In this context, I want to promote the idea that energy is an issue for each one of us and that there is something that each of us can do to solve the issues of energy and climate change.

Confronting the Climate Crisis and the Disempowerment of the Common Person

The means that we are using to achieve this goal, which is also an important method to confronting the climate crisis, is to create a temple-based energy supply system. Practically speaking, we are supplying electric power. We are encouraging other Buddhist temples and their members as well as surrounding communities to switch their electricity supply away from Japan’s old, established utility companies and have us supply electricity to them. We put aside 3.5% of the profits of these sales to create what we call our Warm Heart Fund. From this fund, we make donations once a year to nonprofit organizations, temples, or other groups that are working on social welfare or social justice issues, such as climate change or prevention of suicide. Since we are incorporated as a corporation, naturally we aim to make a profit and use the profits appropriately. Specifically, we gain a gross profit of 15%. Our net profit is between 8% to 10%. I suppose our profit margin is unbelievably low compared to other for-profit companies. We are raising funds only by getting temple priests to be our shareholders. Therefore, when we make a profit, we may give dividends to our shareholders. However, our shareholders may also decide on more exciting ideas, like supporting some hopeful project or donating the money.

There are roughly 70,000 Buddhist temples in Japan. If all of these temples and 20 member families from each of them were to switch their power supply to Tera Energy, we would be able to raise a total of 8 billion yen ($74 million) for the Warm Heart Fund every year. This is roughly equivalent to the Japanese government’s budget currently applied to prevent suicide, roughly 7.7 billion yen. If we could find many people to support this concept, we could create a big difference in society. One of the reasons I decided to start this company was the struggles we were having raising funds to do the suicide prevention activities I have been involved in. We collected an initial capital of ¥16 million, and we have collected another ¥50 million in bank loans. According to our plan, we should reach the break-even point in our third year. We will reach that point if we get roughly 3,000 households. We have a total of 250 customers as of April 2020, which includes 150 temples from the Rinzai Zen, Soto Zen, Jodo Pure Land, and Honmon Butsuritsu Nichiren denominations as well as my own Jodo Shin Pure Land denomination. Our coverage area began in June 2019 in the Hiroshima region traditionally covered by the Chugoku Electric Company, then expanded in January 2020 to the Osaka and central Japan regions under the Kansai Electric Company, in March 2020 to the southern region of Japan under the Kyushu Electric Compnay, and in April 2020 to the Tokyo and eastern Japan regions under the Tokyo Electric Company.[1] Thus far, our marketing system is basically using word of mouth through our temple networks as priests. Our staff is now going around home to home doing sales activities in Hiroshima. If we rely on advertising, consumers will probably choose based on emotion rather than considering things properly, and we do not want that. We would also have to spend a significant amount of money to use the marketing power of GAFA and other such companies. Although this is a slower approach, it also helps to build trust.

In this way, I want to create an understanding that addressing energy issues can actually make our life happier and richer. Rev. Hidehito Okochi has mentioned in Japan there are many negative reactions against campaigns to support ecology or the environment. In this way, even if we try to encourage people to think about the environment or ecology, many people react negatively. Thus, there is a need to change the way people perceive ecological issues so that their sense of values can shift. To get people to relate more to environmental issues, it is important to make it very simple. We are sending the message very simply in our advertising that if you switch your energy supply to Tera Energy, that itself helps you to contribute to solving the climate crisis. We promise to provide energy that is 77% or more comprised of truly renewable energy. We also promise not to provide any energy that comes from nuclear power plants.

The graph on the left shows the percentage of renewable energy in the total energy supply of Japan in 2016. Only 7% of that energy comes from renewable sources in Japan, while 2% is nuclear[2], 8% is hydro, 9% oil, 32% coal, and 42% natural gas. By switching to Tera Energy, consumers can use at least 77% renewable energies that come from solar, wind, hydro, and biomass, plus your energy will be nuclear free.

To this end, we gave some special thought to our pricing structure. We have tried to provide very reasonable pricing based on two policies: 1) ensure that our price structure is very transparent; 2) assure that the price is linked with the market price. Concerning our price transparency, we are always providing information on the breakdown of the costs for our energy. We explain how much is for actually procuring the power; how much is the grid usage fee; how much is our commission; and how much we pay as a special fee to the government. When we provide energy to households, Tera Energy takes a commission of roughly 15%. When we try to encourage new people to sign-up, it’s important to have transparency about the pricing and to provide an attractive price that is affordable for them, preferably less than the going market rate. Fortunately, or not, the large utility companies charge a very high price for energy, so it is not difficult for us to sell the electricity for less.

Concerning the link to the market price, in Japan there is a power supply demand market where the price for buying and selling electricity is determined in 30-minute time slots. At midnight, the price is the lowest at about 6 to 7 yen per kilowatt/hour. Meanwhile, in the evening when demand is very high, the price rises to about 12.5 yen per kilowatt/hour. In Japan, most of the old, major utility companies charge a fixed fee regardless of the actual cost of electricity. That might seem to ensure a stable price. However, these utility companies are charging a price that is actually much higher than their actual cost in order to hedge their risks. As such, most of these utility companies sell electricity at a higher price than need be and make people think that that gives them security. Instead of leaving everything up to the utility company, we want our customers to think about their energy use themselves. That is why we apply a fixed commission rate to the procurement cost of the electricity, so that the consumer can decide what time of day to buy energy and how much they will pay for it. The electricity price data is available on the internet, so anyone can access this information. We provide electricity in such a way that each consumer can think about their energy consumption and understand how they are connected to the world.

If Tera Energy can succeed, it will show how corrupt the pricing systems of big energy companies are. They have many hidden costs and are making vast amounts of money because most of us do not understand how the system works. The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) has actually been making profit the last couple of years even though they are dealing with the massive costs of cleaning up the nuclear accident in Fukushima and also paying out to the people whose lives they have destroyed. Yet somehow they are still making profits.[3] Much of this is enabled by government subsidies and bailouts paid by the Japanese tax payer. Furthermore, the Tokyo Electric Power Company is the number one advertiser in the western Kansai region, even though they do not operate there. Toyota, the familiar auto maker, is the number two advertiser in the region. Toyota uses an average of 40 billion yen a year on advertising, while TEPCO uses 80 billion yen on advertising. Further, private broadcast TV in Japan is generally provided for free, and it relies on advertising. In this way, no TV celebrity dares to say anything bad about these old, huge power companies. If they were to raise their voice against nuclear power, they would no longer get any jobs. The system is obviously stilted in favor of these large companies.

However, our customers are made aware of this pricing system, so that they can make wise decisions about whether or not to use electricity at different times—as opposed to our usual approach to use it as much as we like anytime we want which leads to waste. Ultimately, by thinking well about the use of electricity, consumers can secure a stable and reasonably priced supply of energy. Japanese housewives are very sensitive to prices, and if they see that something is sold for less at a supermarket far away, they will go there rather than spend extra at a local supermarket. In this way, I am hopeful that if they become aware of when electricity is expensive and when it is cheap, they will try to adjust their use accordingly and in turn create a much more ecological usage pattern. For instance, if families decide to enjoy a barbecue outdoors in the summer without electricity when the prices peak between 4:00 pm and 7:00 pm, they could save money. This past year in the summer time, the price went as high as 70 yen per kilowatt/hour, which shows that it can fluctuate quite dramatically.

The Warm Heart Fund and Community Development

At present, I am having talks with many different temples on how to make use of our Warm Heart Fund. For instance, I am talking with the abbot of a temple in a rural area where there are fewer and fewer young people and most of the people are elderly. We are discussing how to make a school where more experienced elderly people can lead classes to share their different special skills with the next generations. We could use our Warm Heart Fund to help run the school. One of the members of this temple actually has a certificate as a master cook of Japanese soba noodles from Japan’s most famous soba restaurant. However, so far, no one has recognized it, and he has had no chance to really show his capabilities. We are hoping such people can share, show, and teach about such skills to other people and that this would help to revitalize the community. There is another Buddhist temple which is holding exercise classes for elderly people, but because they do not have enough budget, they are not able to hold the classes as frequently as they would like. We are thinking of using the Warm Heart Fund to help them hold regular exercise classes. I personally feel there are many people in Japan who have very beautiful ideas and wonderful aspirations to do good. However, many such people who want to do good are not so good at raising or using money. I’m hoping Tera Energy can support those people to carry out their activities better.

We also have another program to install solar power for an initial fee of zero yen, which is an approach that is becoming popular in Japan and which I think can be helpful for farmers and people in poor, rural regions all over Asia who have little to no electricity. The process is that Tera Energy asks the person to let us use some of their land to set up solar panels and generate power from which our customers will then purchase that power. In Japan, it takes about 10 years to earn enough money from selling electricity to pay off the initial cost of the solar panels and start making a profit. Once Tera Energy has recouped our investment, then we will transfer ownership of the solar panels to the person who had initially provided the land, and they can then generate their own electricity for free. Whether this is viable or not depends on the electricity price. I am not saying it will always work as a solution. Nowadays, there is also the very rapid evolution of battery technology, and the price of high-performance lithium ion batteries is coming down. It is getting to the point where such off-grid systems with batteries are becoming relatively feasible.

In Japan, people are saying we have made a shift away from the age of selling things to the age of selling experiences or amazing moments. I think being able to stay here at the Deer Park Institute in the Himalayas is just that sort of experience that people would see great value in. It might be difficult for just the people here at Deer Park to coordinate all that and make a compelling program for other people. However, if you can work with someone who is good at packaging these kinds of services, you might be able to make a very compelling offer to society. I think Buddhism has tremendous value, also in an economic sense, which we can make more use of. People in society are quite exhausted with their current lifestyles, and Buddhism has a role to play to help them out of that situation. One example of selling an experience that might be of interest is a program where farmers who have additional land that they are not farming can work with another partner to lease out their land to city people. The city people can rent that land and grow vegetables or whatever they want on the weekend, and during the weekdays the staff will tend to the fields. This is an example of a creative way to create a good experience. There are some other farmers who have created shareholdings where they get people to buy shares in their farms. Based on the number of shares that they buy, they will be able to get vegetables or crops from that field a number of times a year. This is another creative way of making a new source of funding for farming. Yet another business model is where companies who want to provide training for their employees will tie up with farmers and send their employees to work at a farm for one month. The company will pay a fee to the farmers to have their staff trained.

Buddhism & Business

Until two years ago, I was working at the headquarters of the Jodo Shin Hongan-ji Pure Land denomination, the largest Buddhist denomination in Japan. However, I felt I could not do much there, so I quit. I feel it is not enough to try and shake things up inside our own denominations. It is important to go out into society in general, which can then lead to changes inside our denominations. One of the successful new business models are the various types of self-help type activities or motivational workshops, such as mindfulness training programs. It is actually the business savvy people who understand the true business value of what we Buddhists are doing, such as mindfulness. Serious practitioners of Zen probably never thought that what they are doing could have economic value. Among these people who are trying to use meditative practices for business, there are some really tricky, not so good players, but there also are some really well motivated people. I think it is good for us to look for reliable partners in the business sector and provide the value we can to them while also strengthening the basis of our temples. For example, the business sector looks at temples as being a large, potential market constituency, since there are 70,000 temples across the country with on average 30 to 40 affiliated member families. Furthermore, quite a few companies are interested that we are taking a Buddhist approach rather than many conventional charities that tend to be created by Christian groups. I have been surprised at how much the business sector has been interested in what we are doing. Especially people who feel there are serious problems in our environment and in our society and who feel that there is a need for change have really given us positive feedback.

This is an important issue in Japan, because priests have a negative image of being just businessmen making money from doing funerals. Many Japanese do not like religion and do not like Buddhists, so they might respond to our activity as another crazy business idea by a Buddhist priest to help him drive a Mercedes Benz and have a beautiful life. In the past, a Buddhist priest/monk was better educated than a common person but now there is no difference in terms of knowledge. Further, any knowledge that a priest has is available for free on the internet. Anyone can study it if they want to, so perhaps common people do not see much value in what the Buddhist priest knows anymore. In order for us Buddhist priests to maintain trust in society, I think it is very important to be open and transparent. I do not know about other countries, but in Japan most Buddhist temples are not very transparent about their funding. They try to hide such information, so many people in society think that the temples are vested interests protected by the establishment who do not even need to pay taxes. On the surface, they will bow their heads and show respect, but in their hearts many people distrust the temples. Of course, it is important to do good work to regain their trust, but it is equally important to be very open and transparent. I heard one meditation teacher say, “The tea must be the same, but the cup needs to change according to the culture”. I agree with him. In fact, the tea does not even need to be in a cup! There may be other good ways of serving tea. Such creative thinking is hard to find if you are just spending all of your time in the temple meditating. I think it is also important for us to go out into society at large and have real dialogues with different types of people.

In conclusion, having worked to help people who are you feeling suicidal, I have come to realize there is a need to change the structures in our society to address this problem. In order to change society, it is not enough for us to be doing our own practice among ourselves in the temple. I feel we really need to reach out to society. In Japan, there’s a saying, “The nail that sticks out gets hammered back down”, and there are indeed people trying to hammer me down right now. Some bigger Buddhist temples with more influential priests seem to be looking at us are more suspicious. They are not quite so positive about what we’re doing. I feel this is proof that I am really reaching out to society, so I don’t let it get me down and I am all the more motivated to reach out. In fact, years from now, I’m hoping to expand this mechanism throughout East Asia. At that time, I will need your cooperation.

At present, our funds are quite limited, so it would be difficult to support any activities outside of Japan. While I hope we will be able to support that kind of activity in the future, I would rather be happy if you would copy or take something from this mechanism and make a similar mechanism in your own country. That would be even more effective. It actually does not cost that much to start this mechanism. If you have a customer management system and a way to connect to the power supply and demand market system, you can start a business like this. Nowadays, you can place your server on the cloud rather than pursing your own server, so that also helps you to reduce the starting fees. The electricity market was deregulated in Japan only in 2016, so these kinds of efforts are just getting started. The deregulation of electric power is a global increasing trend, so in the future I am hopeful that other countries in Asia that do not allow the procurement and sales of electricity, like Thailand, will also allow a system like this. The utility business is one where there is a big advantage of being early in the market, so I would encourage you to be prepared so that once electricity is deregulated in your country you can be one of the first players and gain the advantages of that.

Editorial Comment: In thinking about economic sustainability for engaged Buddhist non-profit organizations working on community development and social justice, Tera Energy has created a system on a business model that has been applied to the field of (solar) energy. You could use the same business model doing something else, especially for countries like Thailand where you cannot sell electricity. The model is basically collecting a group of Buddhist temples that will provide some marketable service, make a profit from it, and then put a percentage of it back into social development. This is a mechanism that could work in other Buddhist countries where there are many temples, such as Thailand and Myanmar. If you develop a social awareness when you link the temples together and collect the capital, you could make that capital work towards something quite revolutionary. What Tera Energy is doing in Japan is also a part of a reform movement within Japanese Buddhism. For years, temples and priests have been accused of being socially passive and just enjoying the money they make from performing funerals for their own hobbies, especially as laicized priests who can live just like common people. Tera Energy is part of part of a general reform movement to inspire temples and priests to think about what they can do for the community. This is not just a question of being a good priest, but also about the very survival of the temple. Many Japanese have become very secular and are leaving their family temples. The temples are struggling to survive economically, and many predict a sharp increase in abandoned temples which has already begun in rural areas. In this way, they have to redefine their social goals and show that they are doing something to help the people and benefit society, to prove their social worth. Japanese Buddhist priests may seem utterly incomparable to their monastic counterparts in the rest of Asia. However, whether married priest or celibate monk, the ones who are respected are the ones who give both their time and energy to the people and work for the people. There are just as many Theravada monks as Japanese priests who are self-absorbed and do not work for the people, and in both cases the people do not really respect or care about them. The difference is not in the practice of Vinaya, it is in the heart and how much the priest is actually sacrificing and putting energy into the community.

Talk translated in real time by Tom Esklidsen. Transcript by Cedric Boudry. Article edited by Jonathan S. Watts

[1] Until the Japanese electrical generation market was deregulated in the 2010s, there was a group of regional electric power companies that operated as virtual monopolies in their respect regions under the guidance of the central government of Japan.

[2] From 1985 until the Fukushima nuclear incident in March 2011, the percentage of Japan’s electricity generated by nuclear was anywhere from 27% to 34%.

[3] TEPCO reports on their own corporate homepage, the following net profits: 2011 (the year of the Fukushima incident) -781 billion yen; 2012: -685 billion yen; 2013: +438 billion yen; 2014: +451 billion yen; 2015: +140 billion yen. https://www4.tepco.co.jp/en/corpinfo/ir/data/indicator-e.html

Tera **(Temple) Energy:**

Priests Taking on the Challenge of Being Small Energy Providers

An Interview with Rev. Ryogo Takemoto (Abbot & CEO)

Bukkyo Times May 16, 2019

Rev. Ryogo Takemoto is the 41 year-old abbot of Saisho-ji, a Jodo Shin Hongan-ji Pure Land denomination temple located in Katsuragi City in Nara Prefecture. Last year in June, he established a new company called Tera Energy (tera=Buddhist temple) based in Kyoto City, which in April of this year began selling electricity within Hiroshima prefecture. Instead of Japan using nuclear as a basis for generating electricity, he would like to help realize the goal of more than 70% renewable energy (feed-in-tariff supply included) for the total electricity supply of Japan. With the idea of creating a mechanism to return part of the profits of selling electricity to communities of which Buddhist temples are a central part, Rev. Takemoto is enthusiastic about “realizing a society without isolated individuals”—social isolation being one of Japan’s most problematic issues.

Tera Energy’s Unique System of Temple Based Energy Suppliers

With temples acting as energy contractors, they have established 11 temple suppliers for the 30 temples and their parishioners of 2 sub-sects of the Rinzai Zen denomination and of the Jodo Shin Hongan-ji denomination in both Hiroshima and East Hiroshima cities. Electricity will start being supplied to these places in June of this year. This is all part of a larger movement nationwide to increase the ratio of renewable energy by shifting from the old system of a small group of monopolized electricity providers to new electricity provider ventures. By November of 2018, Tera Energy had raised 16,420,000 yen ($150,000) in capital, and at present have 6 officers, of which 4 are Buddhist priests, and one staff. From June 2019, they will add two more staff through public canvassing. They are forecasting becoming profitable quickly through expanding nationwide by the year 2020. Their original expectations for this year was to have revenue of 1.7 billion yen ($15.6 million). However, they will not able to meet this target, and Rev. Takemoto says, “There are some aspects we are looking at that might still be insufficient,” such as lowering expenses through transferring office work, like customer management, within the company and also moving offices around. The revised goal for contracts in this year is 300 temples with 1,200 attached family households for a revenue of 420 million yen ($3.87 million). They claim that the break-even point for profitability is 200 temples and their affiliated households. Usage charges will reflect the market price that changes according to time of day. As usage is divided into a fixed payment, there are no hidden or additional costs to pay. Rev. Takemoto says, “We would like to be able to make an agreement to provide a usable electricity alternative.”

2.5% of Charges Returned to the Temple Community

The distinctive part of their system is the returning of 2.5% of the electrical charge to the temple provider, which they call “asset relief”, a name change from the original “temple support cost”. Those temples with normal contracts, which are basically the home temple of the parishioners, will be the first to receive such returns. These temples will need to then show their plan of using these returns during the period of the contract. Rev. Takemoto says, “Rather than speaking of returning charges to the temple, it’s more of a mechanism or system of donating to a business run by the temple. We could consider such a business as a social (welfare) activity, like building a cafeteria for local children or developing a plan for community restoration for the future.” By developing such an understanding in the community, lay followers may join in through creating such business proposals and acting as support staff. In the specific case that a supplier is not linked to a temple, Rev. Takemoto can choose to initially offer the returns to support a group that is working on environmental issues or his own Sotto Kyoto Self-Death and Suicide Counseling Center.

The Number is Isolated People is Painful

After establishing the company, Rev. Takemoto resigned from his position at the Jodo Shin Hongan-ji Research Institute and resolved to take on the role as head of the company. For a Buddhist priest to dabble in business can invite criticism since it is thought that the aim of a priest should be to rescue people caught in suffering, such as those contemplating suicide. For this reason, Rev. Takemoto created the Sotto Kyoto Suicide and Self-Death Counseling Center as a non-profit organization. From 2010 continuously for 9 years, he put his best efforts into this work, but there were many instances in which he felt he could not continue with it. The strains of running a non-profit that relied on grants and subsidies pushed him to conceive of a new system of support, and this became the genesis of the idea for Tera Energy, whose motto is, “With a rich mind/heart, we can move towards a secure future”. Rev. Takemoto notes that, “The fundamental cause of suicide is isolation. If we can create temples that build community around a group of supporters, then we can definitely help in resolving the social isolation problem in Japan.” And with full expectation, he has vowed to make electricity a lamp for relief and security.

Translated and edited by Jonathan S. Watts

Jodo Shin Hongan-ji Pure Land Denomination’s Buddhist Priests Selling Energy to Support Communities & the Maintenance of Temples

Mainichi Newspaper October 25, 2018

The priests of the Jodo Shin Hongan-ji Pure Land Denomination (based in Kyoto at the Nishi Hongan-ji Temple) held a press conference today in Kyoto to announce the establishment of a retail electricity company called Tera Energy (tera is Japanese for Buddhist temple), which will begin business in April of 2019. The company will sell electricity to temples and temple members regardless of denomination. By re-investing part of their sales as “temple support fees”, they will provide aid for community activities and the maintenance of temple buildings. They will also provide free installation of solar panels with the goal to further prevent global warming.

The company is now in the process of registering with the Shimogyo Ward of Kyoto City as a retail electricity provider. According to Rev. Ryogo Takemoto, a Nishi Hongan-ji priest representing the company, by keeping down advertising costs, they can reduce the cost of energy by 2% compared with larger companies. The electricity will be mostly procured from renewable energy companies, such as Miyama Power HD, a company in Miyama City, Fukuoka Prefecture that supports community energy development. The Climate Network (Kiko-Nettowaku), a non-profit, will also provide support. They also have the aim in the medium-term to develop small-scale hydroelectric power in the wider Sanin region of prefectures along the Japan Sea Coast, such as Shimane, Tottori, and Hyogo. For the time being, Tera Energy is targeting temples and their members in the Shikoku and Chugoku regions of central Japan with the aim of selling energy nationwide by 2020. In their preparatory research of 38 temples in the three prefectures of Hiroshima, Shimane, and Kagawa, 28 temples indicated an interest to switch to buying electricity from Tera Energy.

Rev. Takemoto, who has been working as a representative of the non-profit Sotto Kyoto Self-Death and Suicide Counseling Center, is also using part of the sales from the company as “social contribution fee” for supporting these suicide prevention activities. He explains that, “Through Tera Energy, we would like to support temples and communities that have communal property to support society.” With the wider circulation of electricity sales that until recently have been monopolized in every region by large utility companies in Japan, smaller retailers can provide freedom of choice as they gain certification for their new businesses. Since 2000, there has been a progressive shift in the energy market away from large-scale customers to individual households emerging in April 2016.

Reporting by Tatsuya Tamaki & Hajime Nakatsugawa

Translation by Jonathan S. Watts

Taiwan’s Anti-Nuclear, Environmental & Democracy Movement

Jonathan S Watts — Tue, 13 Dec 2016 12:16:01 +0000

Buddhism and Spirituality in Taiwan’s Anti-Nuclear, Environmental & Democracy Movement

Jonathan S. Watts

In January 2015, our JNEB International Project on Energy group consisting of Rev. Hidehito Okochi, Mika Edaki of AYUS, Tom Eskildsen, and Jonathan Watts visited Taiwan. After visiting South Korea in July of 2014, this was the second leg of building solidarity among Buddhists and other religious leaders working on anti-nuclear issues in East Asia. We made three significant visits with Ven. Chao Hwei (a patron of the International Network of Engaged Buddhists – INEB and a long time social activist), Mr. I-Hsiung Lin (one of Taiwan’s most renowned democracy activists), and the Taiwan Environmental Protection Union (Taiwan’s oldest environmental NGO). These interactions led us to participating in a pilgrimage walk with Mr. Lin’s The People Rule Foundation in the city of Dalin in central Taiwan to raise awareness on democratic change.

with The People Rule Foundation at Dalin’s main Taoist temple

Learning about the early connections with Taiwan’s anti-nuclear and democracy movements was the first remarkable point of our visit. As Rev. Okochi noted in our discussion with I-Hsiung Lin, Japan has no history of gaining democracy with a people’s movement. The old student movement in the 1960s used to be strong, but as Japan developed economically the young people became compromised. Rev. Okochi with a small group of religious leaders founded the Interfaith Forum for the Review of National Nuclear Policy in 1993 as an ethical stance against this kind of situation. However, even after the terrible events of Fukushima began in 2011, it has been hard to mobilize the Japanese people to express their opinions in the form of public protest, even more so with Buddhists and other religious leaders.

The Birth of Taiwan’s Democracy and Environmental Movements

speaking with I-Hsiung Lin and Ven. Chao Hwei at his office in Taipei

I-Hsiung Lin 林義雄 spoke to us about how the progressive movement in Taiwan slowly grew after WWII. Born in 1941, he became a major leader of the democratization movement after being elected a member of the now defunct Taiwan Provincial Assembly in 1977. In the 1980s, social consciousness began to increase, especially when in 1985 the United States increased its ties with mainland China. This led the Taiwanese government to pull out of negotiations with American manufacturers for building a 4^th nuclear power complex. In 1988, the Taiwanese government restarted negotiations, and this became the time that the Taiwanese environmental movement arose.

The first leaders of this environmental movement were academics and experts who had studied nuclear issues in the U.S. and brought back the latest information on the Chernobyl and 3 Mile Island incidents. One of these scientists was Mr. Shin-Min Shih, a professor of chemical engineering who helped to found the Taiwan Environmental Protection Union (TEPU) in 1987. Their work raised awareness of the danger of nuclear energy and also of the monopolization of energy production and its vested interests, a system well known in Japan as the “nuclear village”. I-Hsiung Lin spoke powerfully to this situation:

In the face of such greed and widespread ignorance, we must stand up to nuclear exporters and bring up the charge that every time they export a nuclear power plant, they are placing a nuclear bomb that could be detonated at any time in another country, casting the local people perpetually under the fear of an explosion which may actually happen. There is no difference between exporting a nuclear power plant and throwing a nuclear bomb in another country. This is identical to terrorist action. If the U.S. won’t care about the safety of people in other regions of the world and exports nuclear power plants, they have no right to condemn terrorist actions that harm the American people. If Japan exports nuclear power plants, then all the activities to commemorate the atomic explosions in Hiroshima and Nagasaki will become absurd and ridiculous.[1]

In this way, the anti-nuclear and environmental movement grew together with the people’s democracy movement in working for economic and political, structural change.

By this time, Taiwan already had three nuclear power complexes with a total of six reactors built by American manufacturers and commissioned between the 1978 and 1985. The public had already been sold on the myths of necessity (Taiwan like Japan lacks fossil fuel resources for industrial development) and safety as well as the promise of an abundant of cheap energy. However, in 1991, it was discovered by the public that the aboriginal Taiwanese living on nearby Orchid (Lanyu) Island were developing serious illnesses due to all the nuclear waste that was being stored there. Then, in 1992, the budget for the 4^th nuclear complex in Lungmen was passed by the Taiwanese parliament. These events and growing distaste for the Kuomintang Party (KMT)’s authoritarian style of rule led to a series of street protests.

After 1992, major demonstrations continued along a common route from the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall to the Diet building to the President’s office. The key groups behind the protests were political leaders, NGOs (especially environmental groups and human rights groups), local people affected like those on Orchid (Lanyu) Island and those living near reactors, and some religious groups. These protests have often taken place at the time budgets are ratified. In 1995, a major street demonstration of 30,000 people against the budget for nuclear power took place, and a signature campaign accumulated 100,000 signatures (out of a population of 23 million). One person also self-immolated himself at this time.

Buddhist and Religious Participation

It was in 1992 that Ven. Chao Hwei as a young nun was shocked to see these protests but decided to join the movement. Since then, she has been a leading face of the Buddhist representation in the anti-nuclear and human rights movement. She notes that in general Buddhist monks and nuns do not come out en masse for protests, because: 1) they don’t want to stand out as a single, isolated community, 2) they feel it’s not necessary to participate or mobilize since the general public is already mobilized on these issues. She says they tend to only mobilize for movements that gain no public stature, like the campaigns against gambling and building casinos.

Rev. Okochi signs the guest wall at TEPU’s office in Taipei

Prof. Shih of TEPU noted that the most politically and socially engaged religious people are Christian, specifically Presbyterians. In Taiwan, there are many local community Buddhist and Taoist temples, but they are more concerned with taking care of locals than in broader social issues. There have been some local temples near the reactors that have been active like Matsu Taoist Temple in Gongliao City, located just a few kilometers from the Lungmen plant. On the other hand, the Presbyterians have international links and a wider awareness, so have become active in more political issues, like raising the issue of Taiwanese independence since the 1970s. They have been very active in the anti-nuclear movement with some Catholics joining as well. Prof. Shih said that in the 1980s a group called the 10,000 Buddhas Association萬佛會 became active in TEPU, but they gradually dropped out of such engagement. Other Buddhists, like Ven. Chao Hwei have been active as well as the recently deceased Ven. Chuan-dao 傳道法師 of the Miao-shin temple妙心寺in Tainan. Prof. Shih noted that on the other hand, Fo Guang Sha and Chung Tai Shan, two of Taiwan’s big four Buddhist groups, are close to the KMT, and the head monk of Fo Guang Sha is known as the “Monk of Politics”. Mr. Shih concluded that the religious persecution during the White Terror in the early years of Taiwan and the separation of church and state are reasons why most religious groups stay out of political issues.

The Role of Spirituality

While formal religious groups may have not had a major impact on the anti-nuclear and pro-democracy movement, I-Hsiung Lin has brought a strong ecumenical, spiritual influence into the mainstream of this movement. He says that, “Not only religious leaders have spirituality. Anyone can and will have it, like the way environmental activists have their faith. Not only religious people sacrifice for others. Anyone who does social action has to have faith.” Lin has shown an interest in teachings from various religious texts, like the section of the Hua Yen Sutra on the sixth bodhisattva practice of skillful manifestation that says to never abandon sentient beings no matter the evil they do. He also draws inspiration from the passage in the Bible: “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” Corinthians 13:7. He feels that if one gets involved in socio-political affairs, selfless devotion and faith is a basic training one must have in order to put others first. Unfortunately, he notes, the dominance of the KMT over decades has oppressed the people’s spiritual development as well as progressive thinking.

Rev. Okochi speaks with a Buddhist monk on the walk in Dalin

In terms of protest strategies, he has learned much from Gandhi and Martin Luther King. He notes that the purpose of political engagement is to benefit the people, and thus the methods should benefit the people. In this way, “getting angry and fighting doesn’t benefit the people. Peace is attained by peaceful means. The purpose of various actions is to awaken insight in the opponent of their mistaken stance and make them willing to change.” When he meets young people in the protest movement, he reminds them to realize that the KMT is also part of society and that they cannot achieve peace by violent or adversarial means. So he maintains the motto, “If you love Taiwan, you should love the KMT” but also tries to educate them on their mistakes. “Bad things happen but people are not evil.” These words became even more profound when we learned that while Lin was in prison in 1980 for his pro-democracy activities, his mother and twin 7 year old daughters were stabbed to death after his wife notified Amnesty International of his unjust treatment.

In this way, Lin has worked to change the culture of protest in Taiwan by engaging in silent all night vigils or silent pilgrimages all over the island to raise awareness on these issues. These pilgrimage walks began in 1992, and Ven. Chao Hwei has participated. During them, everyone wears simple straw hats to protect against the sun and to create an identity of equality and no hierarchy. They have often begun and ended at the famous Buddhist-Taoist temple in Taipei called Lungshan. Eventually, all this work came to fruition when Lin became the 8th Chairman of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) from 1998 to 2000 and successfully ran a campaign for Shui-bian Chen as the 10th President of the Republic of China, ending the KMT’s stranglehold on power since the forming of the nation. In typical style, Lin retired from his post at the top of the DPP immediately following Chen’s election in May 2000. He notes that while the progressive movement peaked in the 1990s, it stagnated in the 2000s. Many of their ideals remained unrealized, and so the DPP fell out of power in 2008. He comments that the present young KMT leaders unfortunately still think in old ways, so no progress has been made since 2008, especially regarding policy with China.

The 2014 Anti-Nuclear and Sunflower Student Movements

Green Consumerism!!?? at the Kuosheng Nuclear Power Plant PR Center in northern Taiwan

However, yet again, the youth responded to this return of the KMT with the Sunflower Student Movement of March and April 2014, which not only included protests against the KMT’s new cross straits trade agreement with China but also the looming completion and start up of the 4^th nuclear power plant at Lungmen. In 2011, in the wake of the Fukushima disaster, Taiwanese environmental groups had called for a national referendum on whether to start or scrap the new complex. Lin explains that the KMT argued the majority of the people wanted the plant in order to provide cheaper and more reliable electrical sources, but he felt it was clear that up to 70% of Taiwanese were against it. So when the KMT kept pushing on with it after hundreds of thousands of Taiwanese had gone into the streets to protest in March 2014, he decided on April 22 to begin a hunger strike at Taipei’s Gikong Presbyterian Church. Earlier, Lin had articulated his wider vision for the anti-nuclear movement, which reflects a strong sense of Buddhist value and thought:

The success of the non-nuclear movements in Asia will not only free Asia from nuclear disaster, but it will also elevate the hearts and minds of Asia’s people. The movement will equip the people of Asia with right thinking and adequate strength to create a new world of peace and joy…And when people have gained rightful thinking through serious reflection, they will have attained the values and ethics suitable to our modern times. Then the people of Asia will understand rightly why people and nations have to help one another to mutual prosperity, and not only look to one’s own selfish interests. Once such worldview is attained, hostility and conflict between nations will diminish. At the same time, the people of Asia will understand that governments are to serve their peoples’ welfare, affirming the status of citizens and the responsibility of governments. Such thinking is the catalyst to harmonious interaction between the government and its people, thus greatly reducing domestic friction and disputes. It is such kind of Asians who will naturally make a significant contribution to world peace, bringing more glory to the future of humankind.[2]

Before his fast, he asked Ven. Chao Hwei and a Presbyterian leader to give him a blessing. Ven. Chao Hwei and her colleague, Chan Master Ven. Shing Kuang, also taught him how to sit properly in meditation to preserve his vital energy during the fast. Eight days later, he ended the strike when the government pledged to halt construction on the power plant. In September 2014, Taiwan Power Co. submitted its plan to the Atomic Energy Council (AEC) to mothball Unit 1 and halt construction on Unit 2 for three years beginning in 2015. However, the proposed 2014 national referendum to decide the ultimate fate of the power plant was rejected from the ballot for contradictory and confusing language, despite gathering more than 120,000 signatures.

It was then to this democratic issue that Lin turned his concerns forming The People Rule Foundation (人民作主教育基金會) on July 4, 2014. As of 2016, no national referendum in Taiwan has been carried out validly. In each of the six national referendums, “Yes” votes have won a majority over “No” votes. However, the referendum results were invalidated each time due to low turnout rate. According to the Referendum Law, a 50% turnout of qualified voters is required for the referendum to be valid. The threshold has yet to be reached, as the KMT has asked its supporters to boycott each referendum. In this way, The People Rule Foundation has further developed these national pilgrimage walks to raise awareness on this issue, and on our last day in Taiwan we took part in such a walk in the city of Dalin in central Taiwan.

Spiritually Based Political Conscientization

stopping for a moment of reflection on the march in Dalin

On a sunny Sunday morning in January 2015, Rev. Okochi and I travelled by high speed train and car from Tapei to the town Dalin, a short distance north of Chiayi City. We were immediately struck by the gathering spot for the start of the walk, a major Taoist temple in the middle of town. In meeting with I-Hsiung Lin in Taipei, we had certainly gotten a strong sense of the spirituality behind the movement, yet the use of Taoist and Buddhist temples as strategic points of gathering showed how his sentiments had become an integral part of the movement. After being welcomed by the community leader of the temple and other locals who spoke on the issues, we set out wearing our straw hats and shirts that said in Chinese characters “The People Rule 人民作主: A Non-violent Movement 非暴力行動”.

From roughly 10:00 to 15:00, we walked through the streets and environs of Dalin in two sets of single file lines, remaining silent and mindful, while passing out leaflets on the referendum issue. Every 30 minutes or so, we would stop, usually at a local Taoist temple, to meet with the members of the temple and the general community to talk issues and offer a prayer. The images of these stops remain strong: the first Taoist temple where we also met a Buddhist monk who had come down from Taipei to join the march; a Taoist shrine at an important historical site on the river on the outskirts of Dalin; another Taoist temple, one of the oldest in Taiwan, in the center of Dalin’s bustling marketplace; an old movie theatre from the WWII period that is facing demolition but which locals want to preserve and revive; and finally Zhaoqing Buddhist Temple on the outskirts of town. At the end of a day of silent walking mixed with energetic conversations at our group stops, we held a final group meeting and conversation next to the Dalin railway station. The group leaders were more than kind and generous in including Rev. Okochi and I in conversations despite the language barrier.

All throughout the day, I recalled the very similar anti-nuclear and peace pilgrimages I had done with the Nipponzan Myohoji denomination in Japan over the years. Here in Taiwan, the striking of the drums and chanting of the Lotus Sutra was replaced by silence, while the inter-faith element in Japan that usually involved Christian groups was replaced by Taoist interfaith connection. The one major difference between the two pilgrimages is the far more marginal nature of the walks in Japan. The walks in Taiwan have been led by a major, progressive political force in I-Hsiung Lin, joining with a major environmental and democracy people’s movement. Nipponzan Myohoji’s walks unfortunately are confined to a few faithful to the organization, mostly elderly political leftists, while the rest of the Buddhist world shuns such displays of political and social awareness. On a more encouraging note, Nipponzan Myohoji has been a very visible participant in the ongoing protests in front of the Japanese National Diet, starting with anti-nuclear protests in 2011 and widening into anti-war and pro-democracy protests aimed at the Shinzo Abe administration’s attempts to change the Japan’s long time pacifist constitution.

On this thought, we have come full circle from Rev. Okochi’s opening comments on Japan lacking its own people’s democracy movement. Perhaps, then, this is the time at last for Japan to have such a movement. Looking at its neighbors in South Korea and Taiwan, especially the work of I-Hsiung Lin, could provide Japan with a progressive model of blending non-violent spirituality and environmental justice into democratic political activism. Certainly this is something for Japanese Buddhists to seriously consider as they attempt to revive their roles in contemporary society.

[1] “A Non-Nuclear Asia as a Stepping Stone to World Peace”, opening speech given at the 10^th No Nukes Asia Forum (NNAF), Taipei, Taiwan, September 28, 2002.

[2] “A Non-Nuclear Asia as a Stepping Stone to World Peace”.

The Sunshine Temple Project in South Korea

Jonathan S Watts — Fri, 26 Aug 2016 00:30:37 +0000

Won Buddhism Eco-Network

The Economics of Energy Conversion and the Protection of Sacred Sites

The name for Won Buddhism (Wonbulgyo) in Korean) is a compound word for truth, enlightenment, and teaching. Won 圓 means circle and symbolizes the ultimate truth. Bul 佛 means enlightenment, and gyo 教 means teaching the truth. Therefore, Wonbulgyo is the path that leads us to become enlightened to the truth. As a representative of Won Buddhism’s eco friendly movement, I will introduce what we’ve been doing in our religious life for making a sustainable earth, particularly dealing with public interest work like energy conversion. I discuss two main topics: 1) why and how we stand for the anti-nuclear power campaign, and 2) how we have built more than 100 solar powered temples in South Korea. I believe this is not only our Korean society that must face the challenge, but also a global community concern.

Surely none of us has a doubt that we live under the threat of the shortage of fossil fuels, rocketing carbon dioxide rates, and climate change problems. Moreover, we live with the tragedy of nuclear contamination and the fear of nuclear power plant accidents. We have to do anything to mobilize our community to meet these problems. As a religious organization, we follow Won Buddhism’s main slogan, “The world is built based on a relationship of grace; everyone is under the influence of grace; and there is a duty to return this grace with gratitude”. The grace is the earth, nature, our parents, our neighbors, and the law of dharma; nothing can exist outside of this frame.

Jung-Bin Park, the founder of Won Buddhism, said, “Even our natural running water can dry up and lead to draught, if it is wasted.” He also included plants and animals in the category of neighbors. When he founded Won Buddhism, he taught with this slogan: “With this Great Unfolding of material civilization, let there also be a Great Unfolding of spirituality”. Based on his teachings, Won Buddhism is motivated to build a “realistic utopia”. A utopia in the real world can be made possible only if religion and science progress together, along with our healthy body and mind.

The many disasters that we are faced with recently, including climate change, are the consequences of our preference for economic profit over the most important foundation of life, which is nature. This still remains as the greatest task faced by humankind.

Anti-Nuclear Campaign

Won Buddhism has been exposed to the danger of nuclear power for a while now. Our sacred land is under the umbrella of nuclear radiation from 6 nuclear reactors that are only 7 kms away. After the first two Hanbit nuclear reactor was built in Young-gwang, the founding sacred site of Won Buddhism, and began its commercial operation in 1985, Won Buddhism created an environmental NGO called “People who Appreciate Nature’s Grace”. This was the former Won Buddhism Eco Network and campaigned against the additional construction of nuclear reactors, which destroy a balanced relationship with the ecosystem. However, two more reactors were built and went on line in 1995, and then even two more in 2002.

By 2003, the residents of Yeong-gwang were violently divided into two groups: one favoring the plant for economic growth, and the other against it for the morals of life. At this time, Won Buddhism gave temporary written orders to 100 monks and nuns to promote an anti-nuclear campaign. Unfortunately, this campaign was unsuccessful. As a minority group, we were often misunderstood as part of selfish regional movement (“not in my backyard” – NIMBY) that opposed the government’s development plans. Thus, we were unable to make a significant change in the government’s energy policy. At this time, we lacked awareness about the alternatives to nuclear energy, and the common people were still craving for more wealth and more convenience.

In 2011, the accident at the Fukushima nuclear power plant caused a big change of atmosphere in Korea. The anxiety towards nuclear power plants in Korea grew immensely, and the provision of alternative renewable energy sources became more urgent than ever. So November 2012, Won Buddhism started a series of prayer pilgrimages, with three following agendas:

Shutting down of power plants with expired life expectancy (no extensions).
Stop the construction of any additional nuclear power plants.
Improvement of secure operational procedures in the currently operational nuclear power plants, which are 24 in South Korea.

We named these “Life, Peace, and No-Nuke” pilgrimages, which start at 10:30 am every Monday and last for around 5 hours. The participants are from various backgrounds, and the size of each group was different. They also continue on in spite of any weather condition, such as rainfall in summer or snowstorm in winter. Between November 26th, 2012 and September 5th, 2016, Won Buddhism hosted a total of 198 pilgrimages with nearly 4,000 participants, raising awareness for the importance of an anti-nuclear policy. We’ve been asked many times, “When will you stop?” An 77 year old man, who is one of the regular participants, said, “I am old, but I have a responsibility for the young, so I cannot take off. My pilgrimage will end when I die or when the Hanbit nuclear power plant stops.” Today, Won Buddhism is walking on pilgrimage again.

Clean Energy Campaign

Energy is a key resource for society and community, and not just for the economy. With this growing awareness, we has become concerned with energy as a challenge of sustainability. In 2006, we created the Foundation for the Commemoration of the 100 year founding of Won Buddhism, which will occur in in 2016. In 2013, after a considerable amount of effort, about 50 members gathered to launch the Dung-geun Solar Power Co-op in order to discuss and solve emergent fossil fuel energy problems. It is not an organization which is limited as a research organization run by scientists or civil activists. Rather, it is the first religious-funded energy co-op in South Korea, which practices a consumer-level energy switch over.

Dung-geun Solar Power Co-op is an alternative energy, public business group that builds solar power plants on rooftops and parking lots. It is funded by contributions from co-op members, and creates revenue by distributing the generated electricity. Based on the commemoration of the 100 year founding of Won Buddhism, we developed the campaign “Won Buddhism 100 years, Repaying Favors with 100 Solar Power Temples” and were able to collect “solar funds” through donations to initiate the project. As we move forward, we plan on donating solar power facilities to our small temples and return some portion of the solar fund to back to society. Since the beginning Won Buddhism in 1916, we have had an experience with such public foundations, like creating savings associations and providing land to impoverished farmers from abandoned tidal lands.

A century later, in 2016, the small movement, which for thirty years didn’t let a day go by without thinking about anti-nuclear policy, became the foundation for solar-powered energy plants that collects the limitless energy provided by the nature. We developed the goal to install 100 solar power facilities at applicable Won Buddhist temples and institutions as a project funded by the Foundation for the Commemoration of 100 years of Won Buddhism.

There are 3 types of solar power station in the project:

1) Won Solar Power Plant Association: We build a solar power facility (20 kW) and produce electricity with funds that the Wonbulgyo temple has invested and then make a business selling electricity to KEPCO (Korea Electric Power Corporation). Profit is saved with principal money, and we give dividends per invested money. Through this, we promote people to participate in solar power business, and we proceed with a “Sun-Donation” campaign, which donates part of the profits to energy poor strata. Surplus electricity is also supplied to neighboring residents.

2) Low Cost Small Solar Power Plant (3kW/6kW/9kW): on each temple to switch power from fossil fuel to solar. With the addition of being more economical in energy usage and also using batteries for solar power storage, we make an example of a temple running itself with 100% renewable energy. Up to 2015 March, we’ve built more than 12 solar power stations in Won Buddhist temples, rural schools, and social welfare organizations for a total capacity of 500kW. We have a plan to add another 500kW by the end of 2015 for a total of 1,000kW generating in solar power temples.

3) Mini Solar Power Station for Community: We will supply Mini Solar power station (scale of 250W or 500W) to the homes of our believers.

This year, 2016, we achieved our goal of building 100 solar power facilities in South Korea nationwide. Solar power temples earn small amounts of economic benefit. However, they teach the more important role of successful energy conversion, which contributes to reducing CO2 Emission and helps to expand renewable energy proportion. South Korea’s rate of renewable energy manufacture is shamefully low at 2%, much less than the global average. Our work is helping to cut-down solar power costs in South Korea – as we can see through the graph, and to increase the awareness of a nuclear-free world. We would say that this is “realistic energy citizenship”.

Certainly this is not the end of our work. Last May 1^st (2016), we held the commemorative ceremony for the 100th anniversary of Won Buddhism and proclaimed that:

During this global age, people’s lives and destinies are closely interrelated with those of others, and one nation’s fate cannot be separate from those of others. Won Buddhism ultimately aims to build a World of Oneness where peace and equality prevail for all people.

In this way, we plan on operating solar power facilities with the goal of world peace in which every life is respected and of ridding the world of enmities, while promoting mutual life-giving through building some solar power facilities in North Korea, Nepal, Cambodia, Africa, and other parts of the world.

This paper was presented by Ms. Eunsook Cho on Sept. 5, 2016 as part of INEB and ICE’s workshop on Ethics and Ecology: Faith-based Models for Reconnecting with All Sentient Beings at the International Union of Conservation of Nature (IUCN) World Conservation Congress (WCC) in Honolulu, Hawaii.

Won Solar Power Plant Association (Korean langauge only) http://www.wonsolar.co.kr

Won Buddhism Eco Network (Korean langauge only) http://cafe.daum.net/smwonp

Contact: Ms. Tae-Ok Lee, Secretary General of Won Buddism Eco Network
woneco2014@gmail.com

The Zhengjue Temple in Shandong Province, China

Jonathan S Watts — Sun, 03 Apr 2016 09:52:39 +0000

Ven. Master Ren Da (Abbot)

Ven. Miao Hai (Head of Renewable Energy Application)

Background: Zhengjue Monastery of Boshan is located in Mt. Lianhua, Boshan District, Zibo City, Shandong Province. It has an over 1,600 year history, being first built in the Eastern Jin dynasty and rehabilitated in the Song and Jin dynasties. During the Southern and Northern dynasties, Master Baozhi, the national master of Emperor Wu, became a Buddhist monk here. The Third Patriarch Ven. Sengchan and Fourth Patriarch Ven. Daoxin of the Chan (Jp. Zen) Sect both trained here. From 2002, Venerable Master Ren Da rehabilitated and constructed Zhengjue Monastery together with disciples. It took 14 years to finish construction on October 4th, 2015. It has a total of 90,000 sq meters; the buildings are 45,000 sq. meters; the green land is 28,000 sq meters; and the area for solar panels is 20,000 sq meters. While outer environmental purity is important, inner environmental purity is of utmost importance so Zhengjue temple has a lot of emphasis on training, such as three-step-and-prostration practice, like Maha-Kashyapa, the Buddha’s great disciple. Ven. Ren Da took an arduous pilgrimage using this practice to Mt. Wu-tai in 2005 at the age of 64 and Mt. Jiuhua in 2011 and at the age of 70.

Temple Structure: The Zhengjue Temple solar project has been in three phases:

PV power stations of 600kW on 3 roofs (80kW) and a carport (520kW) completed in early 2016.
the power generated is in part sent and stored at an EV charging station at the carport completed in mid 2016. They also use the power for heating water.
the plan is to now move toward an independent micro-grid system, which is off-grid from the main national electrical system, to be finished by the end of 2016.

Total Capacity installed kWp 600
Annual Average Power generated MWh 642.0
Annual Nominal Coal saved 216 tons
Annual CO2 Emission reduced 597.7 tons
Annual SO2 Emission 18 tons
Annual NO2 Emission 9 tons
Annual Dust Particles reduced 163.1 tons

In July 2015, Germany reported that 78% of its electricity was being created by renewable sources, mostly from solar (40%) and wind. In Germany, they have installed 60gW of solar with 60% on residential housing roofs, 2% on commercial buildings, and 20% on open land, so we see how important individual consumers are in this movement. This has all been accomplished in Germany, which is not in the Sun Belt and does not have strong sun light. Roughly 1.4 billion people in the world lack electricity, and 84% of these people live in the Sun Belt so solar power can play an important role in this area. The region of Zhengjue temple is located in the Sun Belt region of the globe.

A good example of the simplicity and effect of solar is that if one installs a 10kW PV system of 100 sq. meters of panels, one can generate 525,000 kWh of power from 1,500 hrs of sun over 35 years. This would reduce the CO₂equivalent to planting 1,450 trees and generate the energy equivalent of burning 270,000 kg of coal. Ven. Miao Hai estimates that solar power costs will be equal to other forms of energy by 2020. He also believes that the cost of batteries for the storage of solar energy will drop dramatically in the next 3 years, because Tesala and other electric carmakers are rapidly developing the technology. Since Germany started to develop solar technology in 2004, the cost has dropped 8 times.

Surrounding environment: There is a big problem of water contamination in China with water from even 200 meters underground being tainted. Zhengjue temple’s water is dug out of a well from 502 meters underground from a source dated 300 million years ago. The pH level is 7.0-7.5, so it is clean, very healthy, and slightly sweet in taste. They use their solar energy to fuel the pump for the well and bring it to the top of the temple, where gravitational power is used to circulate it through the piping systems, which are of a diameter 1.2m and height 1.5m.

Ven. Ren Da works with temple tofu making

Another major problem in China is food safety. Before Ven. Ren Da became a monk, he was involved in the food industry (a general engineer in the government’s food ministry), so he has a very good knowledge of what foods have been affected by GMOs and other health issues. Zhengjue Temple has developed tea-seed oil, which is considered to be even healthier than olive oil. They also import a very healthy, small-grain type of “golden rice” (黄金小米) from a partner near the Mongolian border. Through this partnership, they were able to secure non-GMO rice seeds that they distributed to farmers in they area and are also using on our their land.

There is also a major concern for GMO soybeans, which form a staple for tofu and other Chinese foods. Through Ven. Ren Da’s connections, they have secured non-GMO soybeans for making tofu in the temple. They are presently working on developing better waste treatment at the temple and composting, learning from many other groups.

Eco-Dharma: Tea ceremony is another kind of training done at the temple. The Chinese character for tea called cha 茶 is a symbol for eco-life as it indicates people (middle character) living among grass (upper character) and woods or plants (lower character). Chan practice and tea is one important part of Chinese culture. It was once said, “Every temple has tea; with no tea, there are no monks.” Ren Da compiled from the ancient texts the Chan tea methodology and rebuilt its 12-step process. Chan tea practice combines meditation, tea, music and health in one form, with full appreciation, inclusivity, sharing, friendly connections, and enjoyment.

In Chinese characters: “Protecting the Sacred Land Eco-Temple”. Ven. Master Ren Da (left) & Ven. Miao Hai (right) at the eco-temple meeting in Sri Lanka 2016

Ven. Miao Hai explains that in the way the Internet decentralizes the production and consumption of information, we need to do the same for energy. This will lead to a change in our lifestyles and a revolution in human values, where individuals and all sentient life are respected and live in harmony with nature. Buddhism emphasizes the right of all sentient life, not just humans. Solar power can also help create world peace by moving away from wars over fossil fuels.

Community Development: Zhengjue temple also emphasizes education, such as a summer campus in Chan training for university students. They charge no admission fee for entry, food, and accommodation, unlike many other temples do in China. In 2015, Zhengjue Temple signed a strategic agreement with the Asian Photovoltaic Industry Association (APVIA)—which develops activities, events, and educational opportunities for the PV industry in the Asia-Pacific region—to promote Chan-Tea culture and eco-healthy development. Through such partnerships, Zhengjue temple would like to partner with INEB to further develop this work.

Update November 2016

Ven. Miao Hai with his master Ven. Ren Da have been very busy since our first meeting in late January 2016, visiting various sites in the INEB/ICE network to do needs assessment and installation of a variety of localized solar energy systems, as follows:

INEB/ICE Network:

10 kW PV solar panels donated to the Smart Pagoda (E-T group member) in Chonburi, Thailand, which is in its last stage of construction (July 2016)
new solar panels being installed at Wongsanit Ashram, Thailand

10kW PV solar panels donated to the Wongsanit Ashram training centre in the northern suburbs of Bangkok, where INEB has run programs for over two decades (July 2016)
30kW solar panels donated to the Nagaloka Training Centre in Pune, India, which is a core member of the INEB network and hosted the INEB Executive Committee Meeting in October. The installation will be done by Trina Solar and is expected to be completed by the end of February 2017.
Inspection of the planned Sukhavati Eco Temple (E-T group member) in Tamil Nadu, India for preliminary defining of where, how, and what the optimized capacity is for a PV solar system by February 2017.
Two 5kW PV solar panels will be donated to the Bodhi Hill Learning Community (E-T group member) in Shan State, Myanmar (ongoing)
10kW PV solar panels will be donated to Schechen Monastery in Nepal (on going).
In Sri Lanka, arranged for solar companies to inspect rooftop projects totaling 300mW, and making donations of PV systems for major temples in the next 3 years.

China:

Technical design for 40kW rooftop PV solar system for Guanfu Monastery, Qingzhou, Shandong (March 2016)
Technical design for 400kW rooftop PV solar system for Yunfeng Monastery in Ya-An, Sichuan, China, introducing the biggest solar company in that area Tongwei Group to support directly (August 2016).
Technical design for 300kW rooftop PV solar system for Dongshan Monastery in Suzhou, Jiangsu China, introducing one of the biggest solar companies in the world near to them Canadian Solar to support directly (September 2016).

Ven. Miao Hai, Ven. Ren Da, and eco temple group coordinator Jonathan Watts

Solar Lamps: Donation of Maple Solar System solar lamps made by Canadian Solar to:

Bhutan: Bhutan Nuns Foundation, Bhutan Sangha Body Authority, and Deqing Monastery in Thimpu, Bhutan
Thailand: Chulalongkorn University
Myanmar: Mymmar Temple in Mandalay
India: Deer Park Center in Bir, Bodhgaya Temple, and Nagaloka Training Centre in Nagpur
Sri Lanka few temples and centres, etc.

In total around 40 PV Solar Lamps donated

Partially assisted to have 1000 PV solar lamps donated to people of the Gwadar district of Pakistan via the Red Cross (delivered on Nov.13)

clean energy – INEB Eco Temple

Tera Energy: An Interview with Co-Founder Rev. Tsuruno Koyu

Tera Energy: “Illuminating” Society with New Electric Power

Buddhist Priests Supporting Entrepreneurial NPOs

An Interview with Rev. Tsuruno Koyu, Co-founder

A Sri Lanka – Japan Collaboration

Into the 21st Century with Holistic Buddhist Development for Urban Spaces

A Holistic Buddhist Development Lineage

Holistic Buddhist Development in Urban Japan

Meeting the Challenges of Urban Development in the South through Buddhism

The Four Noble Truths Socialized for Collective Change

“Going Forth” Beyond Religious-based Charity to Social Transformation

Thinking as a Citizen and a Religious Leader

Interview with Rev. Hidehito Okochi

Creating Regional Ecological Corridors in Northeastern Thailand

Buddhist Monasteries Addressing the Continued Exploitation of Forests

Fukushima Study Tour: The Real Meaning of Recovery (fukko)

Fukushima Citizens Raise Voices about Their Ongoing Pain while Building Their Own New Society

Background:

The Culture of Silence and Denial in Fukushima and Japan

The Empty Promise of How Technological Progress Will Solve Our Human Condition

Competing Narratives of History

Resiliency & the Building of Alternative Society among Fukushima Residents

Building a Temple Community for Environmental and Social Change

Shift the Power

A Buddhist Path to Structural Change

Shift the Power: Transforming Japan’s Energy System

1) Building a Citizen’s Power Plant at Juko-in Temple

2) Creating Community Financing Systems for Clean Energy

3) Reducing Consumption as well as Shifting Production

Rebuilding Local Resources, Local Ecology, and Local Community

Shift the Power: Educate, Agitate, Organize[15]

Tera Energy: A Buddhist Company

Building Human Bonds and Community while Taking on the Structural Foundations of Climate Change

Tera (Temple) Energy:

Priests Taking on the Challenge of Being Small Energy Providers

An Interview with Rev. Ryogo Takemoto (Abbot & CEO)

Jodo Shin Hongan-ji Pure Land Denomination’s Buddhist Priests Selling Energy to Support Communities & the Maintenance of Temples

Taiwan’s Anti-Nuclear, Environmental & Democracy Movement

Buddhism and Spirituality in Taiwan’s Anti-Nuclear, Environmental & Democracy Movement

The Sunshine Temple Project in South Korea

Won Buddhism Eco-Network

The Economics of Energy Conversion and the Protection of Sacred Sites

Anti-Nuclear Campaign

Clean Energy Campaign

The Zhengjue Temple in Shandong Province, China

Ven. Master Ren Da (Abbot)

Ven. Miao Hai (Head of Renewable Energy Application)

Update November 2016

Tera **(Temple) Energy:**