Preface
I am pleased to present this report on the 11th Kobe University Brussels European Centre (KUBEC)
Symposium “Green Horizons, Sustainable Futures: EU and Japan Research for Climate-Prepared,
Resilient Societies", which was held in a hybrid format, in Brussels and online, on 20 October 2021.
KUBEC had held an annual symposium in Brussels for 10 years in a row since its establishment in2010. Through the events, we had expanded our academic network in Europe and raised the
proﬁle of Kobe University and other Japanese universities. However, in 2020, the COVID-19
pandemic hit international academic exchange hard and we had to make a tough decision to
postpone the symposium. This 11th symposium was the ﬁrst major event that KUBEC had been able
to hold since the pandemic began, and was also the ﬁrst to be oﬀered in hybrid format. It was not
only an opportunity for fostering our deeper connections with European institutions but also
reconﬁrmed the importance of international academic exchange.
This year marked the ﬁfth time that the symposium was jointly organised with Vrije Universiteit
Brussel (VUB), where KUBEC is located. In July 2015 KUBEC relocated to the international oﬃce
buildings of VUB in order to fulﬁl its role as a base for international collaboration in education andresearch between Japan, Belgium, and Europe at large. This symposium is part of our initiative tostrengthen collaboration with European partner universities and to further foster joint research
between Japan and Europe. This year, the event was also made possible thanks to collaborative
assistance from the University of Kent, and we welcomed participants from Japanese and European organisations, both onsite and online, including the Delegation of Japan to the European Unionand the European Commission in order to bring in the perspectives of policymakers on thepartnership between Japan and Europe.
The theme of the 11th symposium, “Green Horizons, Sustainable Futures: EU and Japan Research
for Climate-Prepared, Resilient Societies", focused on the climate issues, one of today’s most significant and serious challenges on a global scale. The latest research results were introduced by both
Japanese and European researchers in ‘Economics’ covering a global green economy, ‘Natural
Sciences’ for breakthrough technologies for climate solutions, and ‘Social Sciences and Humanities’ addressing a resilient and climate-prepared societies. We hope this exchange of knowledge
will lead to future collaboration using advanced theories and technology, and we will continue topromote stronger academic and research collaborations between Japan and Europe even in thecorona and post-corona eras.

Masato Fujisawa
President
Kobe University

2

The 11 th Kobe University Brussels European Centre Symposium

Green Horizons, Sustainable Futures:
EU and Japan Research for Climate-Prepared, Resilient Societies
Organised jointly with Vrije Universiteit Brussel
With the support of the University of Kent
Wednesday 20 October 2021
Vrije Universiteit Brussel

Opening

Moderator
Opening Addresses

Keynote speech
Speaker

9:15-10:00
Ken-ichi Yoshida, Kobe University (Japan)
Prof. Masato Fujisawa, President, Kobe University (Japan)
Prof. Caroline Pauwels, Rector, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)
H.E. Yasushi Masaki, Ambassador of Japan to the European Union (Japan)
Ms. Signe Ratso, Deputy Director General, DG RTD, European Commission (EU)
10:00-10:30
Prof. Paulo Ferrão, Centre for Innovation, Technology and Policy Research,Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon (Portugal)

Parallel Session 1: ‘TOWARDS A GLOBAL GREEN ECONOMY’

Theme 1: The Climate Conundrum: WTO Rules or UN Climate Commitments?
Theme 2: The Perfect Storm: Building Economic Resilience in Overlapping Crises

Parallel Session 2: ‘BREAKTHROUGH TECHNOLOGIES FOR CLIMATE SOLUTIONS’Theme 1: Advances in Climate Science
Theme 2: Key Technologies for a Carbon-neutral Environment

Parallel Session 3: ‘ENABLING RESILIENT, CLIMATE-PREPARED SOCIETIES’Theme 1: Social Impact of Climate Change
Theme 2: Local Adaptation to Global Warming

Policy Keynote
Speaker

10:30-13:30
10:30-11:50
12:10-13:30
10:30-13:30
10:30-11:25
11:45-13:30
10:30-13:30
10:30-11:50
12:10-13:30
14:30-14:45

Ms. Elina Bardram, Director ﬀ, Directorate General for Climate Action,
European Commission (EU)Interactive Workshop and Brokerage Event A

14:45-16:15

Interactive Workshop and Brokerage Event B

14:45-16:15

Interactive Workshop and Brokerage Event C

14:45-16:15

EURAXESS Japan Presentation

16:15-16:25

Closing

16:25-16:40(ECONOMICS) ‘VALUING CLIMATE CHANGE AND SUSTAINABILITY’(NATURAL SCIENCES & TECHNOLOGY)(SOCIAL SCIENCES & HUMANITIES)

Presenter

Closing Remarks

Judit Erika Magyar, EURAXESS Japan (Japan)

Tamotsu Nakamura, Executive Vice-President, Kobe University (Japan)
Jeremy Carette, Dean for Europe, University of Kent (UK)
Hugo Thienpont, Vice-Rector, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)

3

Opening Addresses
Prof. Masato Fujisawa
President, Kobe University (Japan)

Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to extend my heartfelt welcome to the 11th
Kobe University Brussels European Centre Symposium, entitled ‘Green Horizons, Sustainable Futures:
EU and Japan Research for Climate-Prepared, Resilient Societies’.
This symposium had been held for 10 years in a row ever since the establishment of our Brussels
Oﬃce (KUBEC) in 2010. However, we had to postpone the event last year due to the coronavirus
pandemic. Even today, the situation in Japan is still unpredictable and unfortunately we have toparticipate online from Kobe as the Japanese government has imposed strict travel restrictions. I
would like to congratulate our friends in Europe as I have heard that things are pretty much back tonormal there. I hope that we will be able to travel from Japan next year. In addition to having a ﬁfth
opportunity to jointly organise this event with Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), the University of Kent
was also involved this time. I am delighted to see that our network is steadily expanding in spite ofthese diﬃcult times for international collaboration.
It is a great pleasure and honour to deliver this opening address in the presence of many
distinguished guests and familiar friends. Please allow me to express my sincere gratitude, inparticular to our honourable guests,
1. His Excellency Ambassador Yasushi Masaki (Mission of Japan to the European Union)
and
2. Ms. Signe RATSO (Deputy Director-General, Directorate General for Research and Innovation,
European Commission).
I would also like to take this opportunity to express my deepest gratitude to
3. Professor Caroline PAUWELS (Rector, VUB),
4. Professor Romain MEEUSEN (Vice-Rector, International Relations, VUB),
and the International Relations and Mobility Oﬃce of VUB, for their warm support in organising
today’s symposium in a hybrid format, which is our ﬁrst attempt at such an event format.
I started my term as president of Kobe University in April this year. I am determined to devote myself
to this role so that Kobe University becomes one of the world’s leading universities, however, we
needed to set sail in the storms of the coronavirus pandemic. The pandemic has made it diﬃcult for
students and researchers to interact internationally, and has signiﬁcantly disrupted international joint
education and research projects. However, while we lost a great deal, I believe that we were able toidentify problems, new knowledge and new values that emerged from the various restrictions. As wehead towards the 120th anniversary of the foundation of Kobe University in 2022, I hope that we will4

be able to take advantage of the various achievements we have made over the years to carry out
reforms and create a new normal for education and research activities at Kobe University. Needless tosay, even in the corona and post-corona periods, the university will continue to conduct basic
scientiﬁc research that seeks the truth through intellectual activity and creativity, and appliedscientiﬁc research that works together with the local community to create innovation, while
contributing to society by developing human resources through outstanding education. As auniversity, we must never forget to fulﬁll our missions in education and research.
Now, the theme of this symposium is adaptation to climate change. Covid-19 and climate change
have many things in common. Both of these issues are related to the survival of humankind and areimportant issues that the international community must work together to address. They also have asigniﬁcant impact on people’s daily lives and economies. Furthermore, reliable scientiﬁc knowledge isessential for providing solutions to these issues.
Besides, this is a very timely topic as the Japan-EU Green Alliance was launched at this year’s Japan-EU
summit, and the United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP26, will be held in Glasgow in 10
days’ time. During the former, they shared the view that Japan and the EU would advancecooperation in various ﬁelds, including energy transition, innovation and support for developing
countries’ transition towards decarbonization and would lead the international community byaccelerating climate and environmental measures. At COP26, a number of speciﬁc actions will be
discussed in order to bring the international community together to tackle a range of climate issues,
with a focus on reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
And last but not least, the latest news that the 2021 Nobel Prize in physics was awarded to threeresearchers from Japan and Europe “for groundbreaking contributions to our understanding ofcomplex physical systems”. Dr. Syukuro Manabe and Dr. Klaus Hasselmann were jointly awarded fortheir achievements in “the physical modelling of Earth’s climate, quantifying variability and reliably
predicting global warming”. That this most prestigious prize was presented for research related toclimate change provides further indication that is a critical global topic.
Today’s symposium will provide in-depth exchanges on the policies and latest research carried out inthe EU and Japan in the interconnected ﬁelds of climate economics, technological innovations, social
sciences and humanities. Whether you are attending online or in person in Brussels, we have tried tostructure the event to be enjoyable for all. It is my sincere wish that today will be a meaningful
opportunity for academic dialogue between participants from Europe and Japan.
Thank you very much for joining this event today.

5Prof. Caroline Pauwels
Rector, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)

Good morning Brussels and good afternoon Kobe. I had the pleasure to visit your beautiful university
so I am very happy to meet you virtually even though physical moments are better than these ones.
Esteemed ambassador Yasushi Masaki, esteemed president Masato Fujisawa, esteemed deputy
director general Signe Ratso, excellencies yokoso irasshai mashita (welcome to the event). Also a very
warm welcome to the representatives of the University of Kent that joins these really fruitfulexchanges.
Dear experts, professors, ladies and gentlemen, it is my honor to speak to you today and my honest
pleasure to be able to do so in person at the already 11th Kobe University Brussels European Centre
symposium. I think that I expressed the thoughts of many by saying that we are hopeful to approachthe end of this challenging era that lasted already for 18 months and that we are gradually leaving
behind as it is demonstrated by the hybrid nature of this event. It is very nice to see all of you here in
the room today and also on the screen in Kobe, and I am also looking forward to meeting our Kobe
colleagues again during the next hopefully physical edition of this symposium although we need torecognize the advantages of the digital era and welcome them as well.
6 years ago, Vrije Universiteit Brussel was honored that Kobe University chose our campus for thelocation of its European oﬃce. It has allowed us to intensify our relationship creating a deeper andbetter understanding of our two institutions and to strengthen our networks. We look forward tocontinuing to do so in the coming years.
“Green horizons sustainable futures: EU and Japan research for climate-prepared, resilient societies”,
that is the title of today’s event and an apt one if we look at today’s burning issues, aging, pandemics,
the current energy crisis, climate only to name but a few. All these topics require a multi-disciplinary
approach and they require an international approach. These are not local issues but global ones thatneed to be tackled on multiple levels all at once. The climate crisis is or at least should be on top of
everyone's mind.
The cop 26 conference you already referred to will be held in Glasgow starting at the end of next week
until November 12th with catastrophic ﬂooding across the globe, wildﬁres raging, hunger due todrought and scorching heat waves. We can only hope that our world leaders will heed the words ofthe youngsters who took the streets of Brussels only last week calling for actions, not mere words nor
slogans. It is our youngsters who urge us to act now and they rightly so urge us to do so immediately.
We owe it to our children and their children’s children to take care of our planet. The responsibility isshared by all of us, each one of us. We must stop the detrimental spiral that we are in and safeguard
our next generation’s futures. Today’s youth is highly engaged. We see it at our universities, in thestreets of our cities. Their passion, their determination, their persistence must embolden us to do so,

6to do more, to do what is necessary.
Awards have been presented for climate related research and actions. A tree of scientists indeed won
the Nobel Prize 2021 for physics for climate research. And just this past Sunday the ﬁrst Earthshot
Awards were set up by the United Kingdom’s Prince William. They are awarded to people andcountries who have already acted and did make a diﬀerence to encourage them to keep on going andinspire others to step up and do more.
As with the pandemic, we must turn to science and follow advice. Science has been telling us again
and again that we are on a wrong path. The IPCC report just veriﬁed all the hypotheses science istelling us also with path to take going forward. We need research and innovation to speed up ourprogress towards change. Therefore, events such as this are important. Government oﬃcials from the
EU are here alongside experts and researchers to discuss and exchange ideas and to hopefully further
engage in joint projects. It is also important to use this occasion to place the EU for substantial andcontinued funding for global challenges like the global warming. But I am very well aware that you
are on the right path to do so. And I am very grateful for that. It is true engagement with others thatwill ensure change.
VUB is a partner in the Utopia network, a European university alliance with now nine members acrossEurope. Through this partnership, again a very welcome initiative of the European commission, we
can be a gateway for Kobe University to strengthen the network within Europe and maybe Kobe
university can likewise be our gateway to its network in Asia paciﬁc. Collaboration is a key between
educational institutions, between governments, countries, private and public sector, and between
generations. We must aim higher and push further. Courage and perseverance are needed. Let’s start
today by working together so we can ultimately bridge the gap towards acting. Enjoy today's
conference and debates.
I thank you. Domo arigatou gozaimasu (Thank you very much).

7H.E. Yasushi Masaki
Ambassador of Japan to the European Union (Japan)

Prof. Masato FUJISAWA, President of Kobe University,
Prof. Caroline PAUWELS, Rector, Vrije Universiteit Brussel,
Ms. Signe RATSO, Deputy Director-General for Research and Innovation, European Commission,
Distinguished Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Good morning,
I am delighted to have the opportunity to give my remarks at this opening session.
As you know well, this symposium takes place today in a hybrid format after a 2-year break caused by
Covid-19 restrictions. I would like to express my sincere appreciation to all those who made theorganisation of this symposium possible.
(Global challenges)
We are currently facing many global challenges. Last year, due to the pandemic, many conferencesand events including this symposium were cancelled or postponed. Even now, many around theworld are still suﬀering from COVID-19. We also recognise that climate change is now the biggest
challenge facing all living things on Earth including mankind. We saw that advances in vaccine
technology made a great impact on combating the coronavirus. We must now mobilise all kinds ofknowledge and technologies to tackle such global challenges.
Today’s timely symposium will pick up on various areas linked to climate research, from naturalsciences to human and social sciences. From the viewpoint of the Japan-EU policy relationship, thisglobal topic covers a lot of our issues of interest.
(Carbon neutral society)
Last April, the Leaders’ Summit on Climate was held. The then Japanese Prime Minister attended it
and declared that Japan aims to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, setting an ambitious target
which is aligned with the long-term goal of net-zero by 2050. Of course, we are all well aware that theEU aims to achieve climate neutrality by 2050 as well through the “European Green Deal”. In order toachieve our ambitious goal, Japan and the EU need advances in knowledge, technology andinnovation related to tackling climate change.
(Green Alliance)
On 27 May, at the EU ‒ Japan Summit, Japan and the EU announced their intention to form a “Green
Alliance” to accelerate the transition of their economies towards becoming climate-neutral, circularand resource-eﬃcient in the coming decades, and to cooperate in supporting developing countries’
transition toward a climate neutral society. In this regard, Japan and the EU aﬃrmed theircollaboration in research and development as one of their priority areas.

8

(Nobel Prize in Physics 2021)
As for climate research, I would like to celebrate here with you this year’s Nobel Prize in Physics which
was given to one Japanese scientist; Dr. MANABE, one German scientist; Dr. HASSELMANN and one
Italian scientist; Dr. PARISI. Their research laid the foundation for forecasts about the future of theplanet, and are bases to understand complex Earth climate systems. Now we can discuss our policies
to address climate change based on their past scientiﬁc contributions. For the future, we will needmore excellent international research collaboration to deal with global challenges. It is therefore
important to build and maintain good and eﬃcient research networks to be well prepared for future
unknown challenges.
(Launch of “Horizon Europe” and “6th STI Basic Plan” of Japan)
This year, in Europe, “Horizon Europe”, which is a 7-year European research and innovation frameworkprogramme has been launched. In Japan, the 5-year “6th Science, Technology and Innovation BasicPlan” has also started. In both of Japan and the EU, science and innovation frameworks have started at
approximately the same time. Moreover, this year also marks the 10th anniversary of the entry into
force of the Japan-EU Science and Technology Cooperation Agreement.
On such occasions, Japan and the EU should join forces to enhance our research cooperation bycreating synergies between both frameworks. There are various options in front of us. It is importantfor both of us to pursue practical and substantial collaboration to build, maintain, and strengthen theknowledge and technology ties between us.
(New Japan PM Mr. KISHIDA’s policy)
At the beginning of this month, Mr. KISHIDA Fumio took oﬃce as the 100th Prime-Minister of Japan. In
the past, he has worked as Minister of State for Science and Technology Policy, which was his ﬁrst
time serving as a cabinet member. Later, he also served as Minister for Foreign Aﬀairs for 4 and a halfyears. In 2015, while he was Minister for Foreign Aﬀairs, he established “the Advisory Board for the
Promotion of Science and Technology Diplomacy” and appointed the ﬁrst Science and Technology
Advisor to the Minister for Foreign Aﬀairs.
On 8 October, in his ﬁrst general policy speech as Prime-Minister at the Diet session, he identiﬁed
science and technology as the ﬁrst pillar of his growth strategy. Therefore, the KISHIDA Cabinet is
expected to focus on science diplomacy and international science, technology and innovation policy.
It should also be noted that, in the same speech, he expressed his intention to formulate a clean
energy strategy which would tie global warming mitigation to growth, and his willingness tovigorously promote that strategy for the purpose of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050.
(Closing)
Japan and the EU share global challenges such as climate change. We also share an advanced scienceand technology capability, as well as common values and principles, such as democracy; the rule oflaw; human rights; and fundamental freedoms. A common understanding of fundamental principles
and values is essential for sharing science, technology, and innovation. This is why we believe thatJapan and the EU should be excellent partners in research to the beneﬁt of both Japanese andEuropean citizens.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Let me conclude by wishing the 11th Kobe University Brussels European Centre Symposium aconclusive success in contributing to closer research partnerships between Japan and Europe.
Thank you very much for your attention.

9Ms. Signe Ratso
Deputy Director General, DG RTD, European Commission (EU)Dear Rector Pauwels,Your Excellency Ambassador Masaki,
Dear President Fujisawa,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is my great pleasure to join today’s symposium particularly as the theme of this symposium, as you
can see, is very topical. This illustrates the shared ambitions, the shared challenges that the EU andJapan have. It is not by chance that the ﬁrst Green Alliance the EU established last May is with Japan.
We share a real concern on the consequences that climate change is imposing on our lives,
communities and economies. But commitments will remain nothing but nice words if we, collectively,
do not act to take these forward. And therefore today, I am throwing back the question at all of us:
how can we turn these commitments into reality? I therefore call for the EU-Japan Green Alliance tobecome the North star of our cooperation in research and innovation. And I would argue, we can domuch more in this respect.
The IPCC report was already mentioned. According to that, by 2030 we need to cut human- induced
CO2 emissions by about 45% as well as reach net zero around 2050, if we want to keep the 1.5°C
target “alive”. Decarbonisation at such speed would be unprecedented in the history of humanenterprise, and it is only one side of the coin. This is because even, if we halt all greenhouse gas
emissions today, it would still not prevent the climate change impacts already locked in because ofpast emissions. Recent developments have brutally demonstrated that the climate crisis is no longer a
distant and uncertain danger. It has become a daunting reality for all of humankind, here and now.
Record droughts, wildﬁres and ﬂoods continue to wreak havoc on communities and destroy
livelihoods worldwide. Barely a day passes by without tragic news in the media about increasingly
severe extreme weather events ‒ from unprecedented ﬂoods in Europe this summer, all say Belgium
suﬀered from that heavily, to the many disastrous typhoons experienced by Japan in the past years.
The IPCC warns that the impacts, severity and frequency will worsen and increase with additional
warming. The consequences are severe, as the risks extend well beyond physical damages. In fact,
climate change is frequently described as a threat multiplier: it exacerbates existing problems andcreates new ones.
Faced with this devastating present and future, what should we, the EU and Japan do?
This is where the EU-Japan Green Alliance comes in. Ambassador Masaki already mentioned that weshare the same ambition, becoming climate neutral societies by 2050. But we cannot do that without
the contribution of research and innovation. Research and development are one of the key priorities
for action, and we have the means to take our cooperation to another level. Let the Green Alliance be
our guiding star in this. Unfortunately, I don’t have a silver bullet on how to achieve this, but I would

10like to share with you just three thoughts.
First, we need to get breakthrough technologies into high gear. Research and innovation have acentral role to accelerate the necessary transitions, as well as deploying, demonstrating and de-risking
solutions. For example, the EU deployed 1 billion EUR for the world’s ﬁrst Green Deal call for researchand innovation. There was an overwhelming response from the research community, worth over 8
billion EUR in both the public and the private sectors. 72 proposals were selected for funding, and I
would like to take this opportunity to encourage Japanese researchers to participate actively in similarcalls in the future.
My second thought, is that beyond technologies, we need to prepare our societies to face theunavoidable ‒ and accelerating - consequences of climate change. Europe is acutely aware of theimportance of building this climate resilience, resilient societies as mentioned also in the title. Thisillustrates the new EU Strategy on Adaptation to Climate Change. It was adopted in February, and setsout how the European Union can become climate resilient by 2050. And research and innovation willplay a critical role. For example, the Mission on Adaptation to Climate Change will be a key
implementation vector of societal resilience. This mission aims to turn climate adaption into an
opportunity to make Europe more resilient, fairer and better prepared to deal with climate
disruptions, such as extreme weather, wildﬁres and infectious diseases. Certainly, we are looking
forward to building also international partnerships in order to do so better. You will hear more aboutanother mission later that is the city’s mission with objective to have at least 100 climate neutral cities
in Europe by 2030.
The third and ﬁnal thought I want to share with you today, is the how: is the instrument we are using
currently for our cooperate suﬃcient? We will continue partnering with countries such as Japan thathave a vibrant research and innovation system. And at the same time, they share fundamental
research and innovation values, as also mentioned by Ambassador Masaki, such as academic freedom,
gender equality, diversity, research ethics, open science and evidence-based policy-making. We havebeen collaborating in projects addressing climate issues already under Horizon 2020, such as, forexample, on advanced biofuels and alternative renewable fuels.
I would also like to mention a very successful example of cooperation in technologies aimed atdeveloping societal resilience. As part of the Horizon 2020 “Technologies for ﬁrst responders” call, theCURSOR project worked on a life-detecting robot for rescue purposes. And this project is a true
“success story”. Three Japanese researchers of the CURSOR consortium recently received the Best
Research Technology Award of the Robotics Society of Japan for their innovative robots which canclimb over and under obstacles to ﬁnd victims in disaster zones. This remarkable accomplishment wasannounced at the Annual Conference of the Robotics Society of Japan last month. There have beenreferences made to the latest Nobel Prize on physics. Just also to mention European researchers likethis and also before, Nobel Prize winners have also beneﬁted from the European Research Council
which is also a part of our programme.
However, given the size of the challenges provoked by climate change, will this suﬃce? I think moreof the same will not do it. This is the time to give ourselves the means to implement the research andinnovation strand of this EU-Japan Green alliance.

11

Horizon Europe, the EU Framework Programme for research and innovation, will be a key platform forcollaboration to contribute to these eﬀorts: at least 35% of its budget is dedicated to climate-related
research and innovation. This is why the Letter of Intent signed by Commissioner Mariya Gabriel and
Minister Takemoto is important as it ﬂags strategic areas to focus our cooperation on, such as theMission focusing on Climate-neutral and smart cities. And to use fully this potential, I think“association to Horizon Europe” would be the most useful instrument. This special status under
Horizon Europe grants many advantages to our key international partners. It is a multiplier of
eﬃciency in research and innovation cooperation.For Japanese researchers, it means your project, if
successful, would obtain automatic funding from the Horizon Europe programme. It also means thatno additional administrative or ﬁnancial arrangements are needed for participation. It also grants
access to a unique network of researchers and innovators in our 25 member states, as well as all otherassociated countries. We started a conversation with our Japanese partners on the way association
works. This enables us to explain how international cooperation is central to Horizon Europe. This alsoenables us to understand how Japan sees its partnership with the EU, and the role research andinnovation plays in it.
Ladies and Gentlemen, 10 days now separate us from the start of COP26 in Glasgow. Research andinnovation will be critical for building climate-resilient societies and for preparing for what sciencetells us is unavoidable. The transition to a climate-neutral and resilient society is both a challenging
task and an opportunity to build a better and safer future for all. A major investment in research andinnovation to enable the huge transitions at stake and to bring about the necessary knowledge andsolutions is needed. At the same time, the EU is acutely aware that we cannot tackle these challenges
alone. In fact, no country, no region, can. Our cooperation with Japan is therefore essential. Yet, it is
not for the COP to look at how the research and innovation actions of the EU-Japan Green Alliance are
implemented. This is for us and now.
Thank you.

12

13

Keynote SpeechPaulo Manuel Cadete Ferrão
IN+, Center for Innovation, Technology and Policy Research,Instituto Superior Técnico (Portugal)

Paulo Ferrão is a Distinguished Professor of Instituto Superior Técnico - University of Lisbon, andPresident of IN+, Center for Innovation, Technology and Policy Research. He is a board member of the
EUREKA Association, and a former President of the COST Association. He is a member of the European
Commission Mission Board on “Climate-Neutral and Smart Cities”, and of the Environmental Advisory
Committee of Rolls-Royce. He has been the President of the Portuguese Foundation for Science andTechnology (FCT). He is author and co-author of nine books and more than hundred peer-reviewed
papers published in scientiﬁc journals.

Understanding the metabolism of the economies ‒ towards a green economy
The metabolism of economies is changing as urbanization and industrialization in developing
countries increases at unprecedented levels, putting signiﬁcant pressure on resource depletion andclimate change. This is because human needs and activities rely on material ﬂows, resulting both inresource depletion and pollution. Indeed, between 1970 and 2017, while the population doubled andeconomic activity grew 4.7 times, extraction of natural resources increased 3.4 times. In this context,
understanding the dynamics of the socioeconomic metabolism is relevant for identifying (un)sustainable development pathways in diﬀerent economies and for examining the evolution of critical
economic sectors’ resource productivity.
Decoupling economic growth from material use and its environmental impacts is the key forsustainable growth, and yet absolute decoupling has mainly been observed during periods of
economic recession. This signals that economic transitions to a less material intensive economy
depend on a variety of factors and that there is a need for more detailed analysis on the underlying
structural changes. This is analyzed by making use of a novel methodological framework. In addition,
the use of science and technology for promoting sustainable urbanization pathways is examined as a
strategy to promote citizen engagement and to contribute towards the establishment of carbon
neutral cities.

14

Parallel Session 1 10:30-13:30
TOWARDS A GLOBAL GREEN ECONOMY
Theme1: The Climate Conundrum: WTO Rules or UN Climate
Commitments?
Theme2: The Perfect Storm: Building Economic Resiliencein Overlapping Crises

Interactive Workshop
and Brokerage Event A 14:45-16:15(ECONOMICS)

15

Session 1: Towards a Green Economy
Parallel Session 1 of the Kobe-VUB Symposium focused on the economic aspects of a sustainable
future. Economists, political scientists, legal scholars, public sector experts, and business people
participated in the session, discussing the topic from various angles. Part 1 of the session was held on
the theme of “The Climate Conundrum: WTO Rules or UN Climate Commitments?” Firstly, Bernard
Siman, O.B.E. (Vrije Universiteit Brussel and Egmont Institute) gave a speech on global opportunities
for bridging the gap between climate and WTO commitments. He pointed out that COVID-19 andclimate change are the biggest challenges facing the global economy. This was followed by apresentation from Prof. Kenji Takeuchi (Kobe University) who explained his recent work on the impact
of climate disasters on global trade. His results suggest that natural disasters have a negative andpersistent impact, although this can be mitigated by enhancing adaptation readiness. Next, Mr. Kevin
Verbelen (AGORIA and Brussels Diplomatic Academy) talked about the Carbon Border Adjustment
Measure (CBAM) from a business perspective.
The theme for Part 2 of Session 1 was “The Perfect Storm: Building Economic Resilience in Overlapping
Crises.” Prof. Johan Eyckmans (KU Leuven) introduced his recent exploration into the distributionaleﬀects of climate change damage channels and mitigation policies, using an integrated assessment
model. Prof. Sebastian Obertür (Vrije Universiteit Brussel) then provided an interesting take on the
COVID-19 crisis. According to his research, this crisis might be a critical juncture for EU Climate policy
development. Prof. Hiroaki Sakamoto (Kobe University) also gave a nice summary of the concept ofcarbon pricing and introduced his recent attempt to consider the nonlinearity of the integrated
assessment model.
In the afternoon, a workshop was held on “Valuing Climate Change and Sustainability”. Four speakers
presented their recent works on sustainable consumption and investment. Prof. Adelina
Gschwandtner (University of Kent) used the hedonic pricing method to estimate consumers’
willingness to pay for organic chicken and found that there is a substantial price premium forsustainable food. Prof. Gunnar Gutsche (University of Kassel) examined individual preferences forsustainable investments across Europe by using a framed ﬁeld experiment. Next, Prof. Kayo Murakami(Kobe University) investigated the heterogeneity of weighting to mitigate global environmental
damages among G20 countries. Finally, Prof. Miwa Nakai (Fukui Prefectural University) reported theresults of her recent study based on surveys conducted in Japan and Germany, which looked into theeﬀect that information about environmental beneﬁts has on people’s preferences for dynamic
electricity tariﬀs. The session gave all presenters a valuable opportunity to inspire each other anddevelop their research networks.

16

Parallel Session 1
Theme 1: The Climate Conundrum: WTO Rules or
UN Climate Commitments?
Kenji Takeuchi

Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University (Japan)

Moderator

Bernard Siman, O.B.E
Brussels Diplomatic Academy, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)

Head of Financial Diplomacy and Fintech at the Brussels Diplomatic Academy and teaches graduate
students “The International Monetary System and Global Financial Architecture” at the Faculty of
Economic and Social Sciences, both at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). He is a former Court
Member of the Worshipful Company of World Traders in the UK and focuses on trade in services. He
was also the UK Special Representative to the UAE for Financial and Professional Services attached toUnited Kingdom Trade and Investment, Co-Chair of the UK-UAE Shipping and Maritime Task Forceand of the bilateral UK-UAE Financial and Professional Services Working Group. Graduate of KU
Leuven, London School of Economics, Oxford Brooks University and Kyoto University (Japan). He
focuses on global ﬁnancial and monetary services issues, trade in services in bilateral and multilateralcontexts, and on the conﬂict between free trade commitments and climate undertakings. He has a
deep focus on global geopolitics and also teaches at the Belgian Royal Military Academy. He washonoured with the Order of the British Empire by HM Queen Elizabeth II and was made a Knight of theOrder of Leopold by HM King Filip of Belgium.

Conﬂict between World Trade and Climate Commitments: Top Policy Priority
The Covid-19 crisis has accelerated and underlined the urgent need to bridge the gap between world
trade rules (under the WTO), on the one hand, and the Climate commitments on the other. This
uncertainty is costly for business and will slow growth in world trade.
This is particularly the case as the EU is planning to implement the proposed Carbon Adjustment
Border Mechanism (CBAM) by 2023, which will eﬀectively be a form of taxation on imported goods
and commodities. Moreover, CBAM may also have implications potentially for “Rules of Origin” issues.
There is an urgent need to provide global leadership in the formulation of ideas and proposals tobridge the gap between Climate and WTO commitments, but also between the fast growing
economies such as India’s on the one hand, and the EU and other mature economies on the other, as
well as among the advanced economies themselves.

17

Uncertainty for businesses is increasing the costs associated with market access for goods. Enabling
businesses to simultaneously comply with both trade and climate commitments is a key operational,
economic as well as policy/legal requirement that will become more pressing post-Covid to support
the return to growth in world trade. In the absence of a resolution by COP on the climate-related
metrics aﬀecting world trade, and WTO action on these measures, it is likely that the new rules will bedecided by judges in order to ﬁll in the gap. That will not necessarily result in the best outcome from a
policy perspective.
The UK can play a globally leading role to resolve this uncertainty that has remained “undealt with”(basically because the WTO leaves it to COP and COP leaves it to WTO), and that is acquiring growing,material and signiﬁcant importance in world trade. There is a clear opportunity for the UK to provide
leadership in two key and strategic areas of British policy that have global reach: free trade andclimate commitments, through action at the WTOC and COP 2021.

Kenji Takeuchi

Moderator

Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University (Japan)

Kenji Takeuchi is a professor of economics. His research focuses on environmental and resource
economics. Kenji received his Ph.D. in economics from Kyoto University in 1997 and joined Kobe
University in 2001.

Resilience of the World Trade to Climate Disasters
This study examines the impact of natural disasters on international trade. Using cross-country panel
data, we investigated the extent to which the occurrence of natural disasters aﬀects monthly exports.
Our study includes data on bilateral trade in order to estimate the impact of disasters on exportingand importing countries. The results of the empirical analysis indicate that natural disasters have anegative and statistically signiﬁcant impact. We found that a natural disaster occurring in a given
month has an immediate and persistent impact on exports, with cumulative losses of 9.6%
forexporting countries and 5.5% for importing countries. Moreover, this study utilized adaptation
measures to analyze the heterogeneous eﬀects of natural disasters. These ﬁndings suggest that acountry’s vulnerability has a negative eﬀect on trade ﬂows, whereas adaptation readiness has apositive eﬀect. The results provide evidence of vulnerability and adaptation associated with disastershocks that may aﬀect the economy through the trade channel.

18

Kevin Verbelen
AGORIA and Brussels Diplomatic Academy (Belgium)

Kevin Verbelen is Company Lawyer & Expert International Trade at AGORIA, the association oftechnology companies in Belgium. He is Chair of the Trade Group in DIGITALEUROPE and Steering
Committee Member of Belgium’s Customs Forum. He is Lecturer & Head of the International
Organizations Pillar at the Brussels Diplomatic Academy. Kevin holds a Master Degree of Law from the
Vrije Universiteit Brussel, a LL.M International Trade and Business Law from the University of Arizona,
and was awarded for his excellence in International Environmental Law. He worked at the Belgian
Representation to the WTO in Geneva and to UNEP in Nairobi.

Carbon Border Adjustment Measure: a Business Perspective
The European Union recently published its “Fit for 55” package. The package contains a collection oflegislative proposals aiming at reducing the EU’s CO2-emissions by 55% by 2030. One of the proposals
is the Carbon Border Adjustment Measure (CBAM). The aim of the proposal is to “mirror”, to a certain
extent, the existing Emissions Trading System (ETS) that is applicable to companies dealing in or withcertain products with a high carbon content. As the ETS is only applying to companies operating in
the EU and as the ETS has to be revised in light of Europe’s climate ambitions, the risk of companies
leaving the EU to countries with less strict climate polices (i.e. carbon leakage) has to be contained.
Current carbon leakage measures are deemed too expensive or ineﬃcient in the analysis of the EU
and its Member States. Hence, the introduction of CBAM. However, the eﬀects of a CBAM could be theopposite of what the EU envisages. If the CBAM would be drafted carelessly and without a profoundunderstanding of economic realities, it may increase carbon leakage. In addition, the risk of
discriminating non-EU products could very well lead to a violation of WTO-rules.

19

Theme 2: The Perfect Storm: Building Economic
Resilience in Overlapping Crises
Bernard Siman, O.B.E

Brussels Diplomatic Academy, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)

Moderator

Johan Eyckmans
KU Leuven ‒ Faculty of Economics and Business ‒ Center for
Economics and Corporate Sustainability CEDON (Belgium)

Johan Eyckmans studied economics at the University of Antwerp and at KU Leuven in Belgium. He
was research fellow of the Fund for Scientiﬁc Research Flanders and in 1997 he obtained a Ph.D. at KU
Leuven on the incentives of nations to form international environmental agreements. Johan
Eyckmans is currently working as professor in environmental economics at KU Leuven. His researchinterests include the economics of climate change, applications of game theory to the formation ofinternational environmental agreements, economics of waste and materials, circular economy, costbeneﬁt analysis, general equilibrium and integrated assessment modeling, and evaluation ofenvironmental policies.

Distributional Eﬀects of Diﬀerent Climate Change Damage Channels and Mitigation
Policies
This paper studies drivers of distributional impacts of climate change-related damages and mitigation
policies between regions and over time using a numerical integrated assessment model. The ﬁrst
group of drivers relates to change-related damages. In addition to damages that are proportional toGDP, we also consider the nonlinear impacts of climate change on productivity growth and capitaldepreciation. The second type of drivers relate to global cooperation on climate policy. The third typeof drivers relate to policies to alleviate possible adverse impacts on inequality across countries bymeans of transfers. We ﬁnd that countries are aﬀected very diﬀerently by climate change underdiﬀerent assumptions regarding damage channels. Poorer countries are often warmer and therefore
suﬀer more from adverse climate change impacts on TFP growth leading to higher global inequality.
But climate change may also reduce inequality by destroying the capital stock of rich regions that
tend to have higher capital values at stake. We show that when cooperation without transfers is
maximized for global welfare, rich regions may be required to exert excessive abatement eﬀorts inorder to reduce inequality. A transfer scheme, based on a global system of grandfathering tradable
carbon permits is proposed to alleviate the impacts of inequality and free riding incentives.

20

Sebastian Oberthür
Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)

Sebastian Oberthür is Professor of Environment and Sustainable Development at the Brussels Schoolof Governance at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) and Professor of Environmental Policy and Law at
the University of Eastern Finland (since 2020). Trained as a political scientist with a strong backgroundin international law, he focuses on issues related to international and European environmental andclimate governance. Before joining the VUB in 2005, Sebastian Oberthür served as a part-timeassistant professor for international relations at the Otto-Friedrich-University Bamberg from2001-2005. He has also held part-time teaching positions at Technical University Berlin, the Université
Libre de Bruxelles and the College of Europe (Natolin Campus).

The Covid-19 Crisis: A Critical Juncture for EU Climate Policy Development?
The EU has demonstrated increasing commitment to combating climate change. In December 2019,
the European Commission published the European Green Deal (EGD) ‒ an evolving, overarchingstrategy that aims to achieve climate neutrality by 2050. Just as the plans were underway toimplement the EGD, the Covid-19 crisis hit. We ask whether the Covid-19 crisis represents a likely
critical juncture for EU climate policy, and why. Experience from previous economic crises suggeststhat climate policy may be set aside. In 2021, the EU’s crisis response seems to somewhat advance EU
climate policy, at least on paper (with remaining uncertainties about actual implementation). Given
the potential for transformational change already embedded in the EGD, we suggest that additional
positive eﬀects of the Covid-19 crisis may not add up to a critical juncture. We reﬂect on the role ofCommission entrepreneurship and the politicisation of climate change and climate policy to explain
this outcome.

21

Hiroaki Sakamoto
Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University (Japan)

Hiroaki Sakamoto is an associate professor of economics at Kobe University, a research network fellow
at CESifo, and a research fellow at Graduate School of Economics, Kyoto University. He is also an
adjunct researcher at the Institute for Advanced Social Sciences and the Research Institute forEnvironmental Economics and Management, Waseda University.

Pricing the unpriced: An interdisciplinary eﬀort to make the market work for climate
By brieﬂy reviewing recent developments in the literature of climate change economics, I will talkabout how and why economics can be useful for tackling the issue of climate change. In particular, I
will highlight the importance of carbon pricing, which eﬀectively puts a price tag on each carbon
emission in the market. Pricing carbon naturally requires interdisciplinary eﬀorts where the cost andthe beneﬁt of carbon emission can be compared in a single uniﬁed framework. I will demonstrate how
one can combine economic and scientiﬁc models to facilitate policy making on carbon pricing.

22

23

Interactive Workshop andBrokerage Event A
ECONOMICS ‘VALUING CLIMATE CHANGE AND
SUSTAINABILITY’
Kenji Takeuchi

Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University (Japan)

Moderator

Adelina Gschwandtner
University of Kent (UK)

Adelina Gschwandtner was born in Bucharest, Romania. After obtaining a ﬁrst degree in Economics at
the Bucharest University of Economic Studies, she moved to the University of Vienna, where she wasawarded her PhD in 2002. She subsequently worked at the University of Vienna until 2011, before
moving to the Vienna University of Economics and Business (WU). She joined the University of Kent in
September 2012. After pursuing research in empirical Industrial Economics for more than a decade,
Adelina has started to conduct research in the areas of Agricultural Economics, Environmental
Valuation (more speciﬁcally on Organic Food) and the Economics of Happiness.

Estimation of a Hedonic Price Equation for Chicken Meat in the UK: Does the Organic
Attribute matter?
Chicken meat consumption has increased substantially in the last decades due to farming andprocessing intensiﬁcation and due to perceived health and environmental beneﬁts for consumers.
Organic chicken additionally, is perceived to have better taste, lead to higher animal welfare andadditional beneﬁts for the environment. Thus understanding consumers’ preferences for organic
chicken is central for policy-making and market strategies that can shape this market in the future.
This paper uses a comprehensive data set of scanned shoppings from UK consumers, to show thatthey are willing to pay an average premium of 135% for the organic attribute in the case of chicken. In
addition, this paper contributes to the literature of environmental valuation, demonstrating thathousehold characteristics can be used as instruments into a GMM approach to a hedonic price model,
to address the endogeneity and eﬃciency issues usually ignored in this literature.

24

Gunnar Gutsche
University of Kassel (Germany)

Dr. Gunnar Gutsche is a lecturer and post-doctoral researcher at the Unit Empirical Economic Researchat the University of Kassel. His research addresses diﬀerent aspects of sustainable ﬁnance with a
speciﬁc focus on sustainable investment behavior at the individual or household level. Furthermore,
he has been working on citizen participation in the transition process to a low-carbon economy. He
obtained a doctoral degree in 2017 (University of Kassel) and holds a diploma in economics (2011,
Georg-August Universität Göttingen). He is also member of the Sustainable Finance Research
Platform.

Are preferences for sustainable investments universal? A large scale experiment in
ﬁve European countries.
To understand the extent to which individual preferences towards sustainable investments varyacross countries, this study analyzes data from an incentivized framed ﬁeld experiment considering
ESG (environmental, social, and governance) and climate-related investment decisions in ﬁve
European countries from May to July 2021. The experiment is part of a survey of households’ ﬁnancial
decision-makers in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, and Spain, with about 1,000
respondents per country. Our experimental design enables us to calculate the amount of additional
fees respondents are willing to pay in order to invest in exchange traded index funds based on the
MSCI World ESG Screened Index and the MSCI World Climate Change Index. This allows us to compare
not only preferences for sustainable investments across diﬀerent countries, but also in terms of thethematic focus of sustainable funds. We also analyze to what extent the relevance of pecuniary
motives, social signaling, and social preferences for sustainable investment decisions varies acrosscountries. Thus, this study is the ﬁrst to compare preferences for sustainable investments at theindividual level across diﬀerent countries, while providing identical information and choices toindividuals.

25

Kayo Murakami
Center for Social Systems Innovation, Kobe University (Japan)

Ph.D. in Economics from Kyoto University in 2011. Currently she is working at Kobe University as aproject associate professor in the Center for Social Systems Innovation. Her research interests are:consumer decision-making, valuation of non-market goods, and environmental beneﬁt transfer;applications of choice modeling with a focus on environmental and agricultural issues such as energy
policy, food labelling, and lifecycle impact assessment.

What determines the values of environmental beneﬁts? Evidence from a worldwide
surveyOne of the key obstacles to establishing international cooperation on environmental issues is the factthat environmental beneﬁts are valued diﬀerently depending on the country. But where does thisdisparity come from? In this study, we analysed large-scale survey data collected across G20 countries
to try to ﬁnd an answer to this question. Combining lifecycle impact assessment and economic
valuation techniques, we found that people’s perceptions of environmental beneﬁts are in fact
diverse, but are highly correlated with a few social indicators such as life expectancy, the Gini index,
and subjective well-being. Our ﬁndings suggest that improving these social indicators in otherwise
ill-equipped countries will facilitate convergence of people's perceptions and will thereby establish acommon ground for tackling global environmental issues.

Miwa Nakai
Fukui Prefectural University (Japan)

Dr. Miwa Nakai is Associate Professor at Fukui Prefectural University, Japan. Prior to her current
position, she worked at Waseda University and University of Tokyo, Japan. She received her B.A. in
Commerce from Griﬃth University, Australia, and her M.A. and Ph.D. in Economics from Graduate
School of Economics at Kobe University, Japan. Her research interests include environmental
economics, socially responsible investments, behavioural economics, and development economics.
She was a visiting scholar at University of Kassel, Germany in 2019.

26

The eﬀect of environmental information on preferences for dynamic electricity tariﬀs:
A case of Germany-Japan comparison
This paper empirically analyzes the eﬀect of environmental information on households’ preferences
for dynamic electricity tariﬀs, based on a choice experiment conducted in Germany and Japan. Ourparticular experimental design allows disentangling two central characteristics of dynamic electricity
tariﬀs. These are the intra- and interday frequency of price adjustments. Overall, we ﬁnd thathouseholds object to frequently changing price patterns. This tendency is remarkably stronger among
German households, which indicates that Japanese residents are more willing to accept ﬂexible tariﬀs.
Our preliminary results furthermore suggest that respondents do not mind several price adjustments
during a day (i.e. 4 and 12 times a day), with the exception of hourly price changes for Germanhouseholds. As information treatment, we investigate whether highlighting the environmental
beneﬁts associated to dynamic electricity tariﬀs increases households’ preferences for more frequent
price adjustments. First results suggest that additional environmental information signiﬁcantly
decreases households’ aversion against daily price adjustments among the Japanese respondents.
With respect to the German sample, the environmental treatment causes the households’ aversion
against hourly changing within-day prices to diminish.

27

28

Parallel Session 2 10:30-13:30
BREAKTHROUGH TECHNOLOGIES FOR CLIMATE SOLUTIONSTheme1: Advances in Climate Science
Theme2: Key Technologies for a Carbon-neutral Environment

Interactive Workshop
and Brokerage Event B 14:45-16:15(NATURAL SCIENCES & TECHNOLOGY)

29

Session 2: Breakthrough technologies for climate solutions
It is becoming clear from various observations and simulations that the greenhouse eﬀect caused by
the increased concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is leading to global warming andsigniﬁcant climate change. The many natural disasters and changes in the living environment causedby this climate change are not just a problem in meteorology, but also in engineering ﬁelds related tohuman life, such as architecture and civil engineering. These are also issues for material scienceengineering, as it is necessary to develop new energy sources and energy storage technologies toreplace the CO ₂ emitting fossil fuels that cause global warming. One of the most signiﬁcantdiscoveries in this ﬁeld is that of “hidden patterns in the climate”, which was awarded the 2021 Nobel
Prize in Physics “for groundbreaking contributions to our understanding of complex physicalsystems”. This means that a fundamental physics proposal on climate change has predicted thechallenges that will arise in the humanities and social sciences. Solving these challenges is proving tobe crucial for maintaining a livable environment for humanity.
At present, these issues are being thoroughly studied in each ﬁeld, with participating universities andinstitutions conducting active research in this area.
Session 2 consisted of three subjects relating to breakthrough technologies for climate solutions.
Advances in Climate Science
The lectures were given by many speakers from varied backgrounds in industry, government, andacademia, including those from Kobe University, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, and its partner universities(Kent University, Kiel University, ParisTech), RIKEN, AIST, and Toyota Motor Europe.
Professor Yoshiyuki Kajikawa of RIKEN and Kobe University presented “Challenge to the New
Generation Computational Climate Science Research” and explained the history of climate models. He
found that the simulated convection core is expressed by multiple grind points in the sub-kilometer
experiment, which advance to resolve the convection for the entire Earth. Dr Giridharan Renganathan
of Kent University introduced his research on “Urban climate‒ Field experiment and modelling studies
on urban heat island to urban Albedo”. This paper discusses the problem in expanding urban climate
concepts (represented by the heat island eﬀect) to the impact of the climate on an entire city, using
Albedo as a model. He reported the results of his empirical study, arguing that monitoring andvalidation under actual physical conditions can be diﬃcult due to resource, time, and physicalconstraints, and that scaled-up experimental models are important in such situations. Professor
Miriam Pfeiﬀer of Kiel University presented “Climate Past and Present: Corals as Monitors of Past andCurrent Tropical Climate Variability”. Here she introduced the German Research Foundation’s SPP2299
research theme: “Tropical climate variability and coral reefs,” which aims to improve predictions
relating to tropical climate and coral reef ecosystems by combining proxy data, advanced statisticalmethods, and Earth system modeling.
Key Technologies for a Carbon-neutral Environment
Professor Takashi Kita of Kobe University gave a presentation on “Industry-government-academia
collaborations for SDGs” and introduced the activities of Kobe University’s SDGs Promotion Oﬃce. He
argued that establishing open interaction enables SDG-related idea sharing and smooth
implementation of outcomes.
Professor Michel Cassir of ParisTech and Professor Minoru Mizuhata of Kobe University gave
presentations on CO₂ capture and valorisation using molten carbonate-based electrolytes with either
moderate amounts of hydroxide or lithium orthosilicate as additives. Dr Noriko Shisa of Toyota Motor
Europe (TME) spoke about “Sustainable Mobility - Towards Carbon Neutrality”. She introduced the
TME’s future plans and developments. She explained that TME is particularly focused on SDG No.13 ‒Climate Action. Toyota supports the Paris Agreement, and will continue its endeavors towards
achieving carbon neutrality by 2050. Professor Maitane Berecibar of Vrije Universiteit Brussel presented“The Batteries of the Future”. The market for batteries, which play an important role as energy storage
devices, is rapidly expanding and this is particularly the case for lithium-ion batteries. This presentation
provided an overview of the issues related to battery development, especially energy density andlifetime, as well as research issues related to their integration with peripheral devices.
R&D on Energy Storage and Power Electronics
This session was followed by an introduction to carbon neutral technology-related research projects.
Professor Hiroshi Suzuki of Kobe University presented “Silica Hard-Shell Microcapsules Containing Phase
Change Material”, which have been developed so that they can be applied to latent heat transportation
systems. Professor Kentaro Kuratani of AIST presented topical R&D issues concerning battery
technologies, in particular the active materials for next-generation batteries. Finally, Professor Marco
Liserre presented “New technologies and materials as driver of tomorrow's power electronics”. He gave
an overview of current and emerging technologies at the component level. It covered magnetics, active
components, integration & packaging technologies, and electric energy storage systems, showing how
materials under development are expected to boost current state-of-the art electronics.

30

Parallel Session 2
Theme 1: Advances in Climate Science
Minoru Mizuhata

Graduate School of Engineering, Kobe University (Japan)

Moderator

Yoshiyuki Kajikawa
Research Center for Urban Safety and Security, Kobe University(Japan)Dr. Yoshiyuki Kajikawa is a Project Professor of Research Center for Urban Safety and Security at Kobe
University (since 2016) and Senior Researcher of RIKEN Center for Computational Science (since 2014).
He received his Ph.D. in science (Atmospheric Science) from Nagoya University Japan and built his
career through Postdoctoral fellowships in the International Paciﬁc Research Center (IPRC) at
University of Hawaii, and the Hydrospheric Atmospheric Research Center (HyARC) at Nagoya
University. He is a specialist in climate system study, especially on tropical climates and Asianmonsoons.

Challenge to the New Generation Computational Climate Science Research
A cloud is the minimum element that makes up organized cloud systems and plays an important rolein the formation of our climate system. It has been challenging to simulate clouds on a global scaledue to the low horizontal resolution of computer models developed using existing computational
resources. Clouds have been expressed through the simpliﬁed process of parameterization. Recently,
the ﬁrst-ever sub-kilometer global atmospheric simulation successfully resolved deep convections,paving the way for the next stage of global climate research. We found that the simulated convection
core is expressed by multiple grind points in the sub-kilometer experiment, which advance to resolve
the convection for the entire Earth. We are currently in a transition phase and working towards thelong-term integration of global cloud-resolving simulations. Next generation computational climate
science research with the history of climate model will be presented at this workshop.

31Giridharan Renganathan
Kent School of Architecture and Planning, University of Kent (UK)

D. Giridharan Renganathan is a senior lecturer and Director of Centre for Architecture and Sustainable
Environment at the University of Kent. His research focus is on Urban Morphology and Climatology(environmental design), with speciﬁc interest in Urban Heat Island eﬀect and indoor overheating. He
has secured large research grants from RGC (Hong Kong SAR) and EPSRC (UK), and European
Commission. He has over 25 peer reviewed publications and 4 book chapters. He received theprestigious Carter Bronze Medal (2016) awarded by CIBSE for one of his publications. He has also
reviewed research grant proposals for NERC (UK), EPSRC (UK), MRC UK) Israel Science Foundation andRoyal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.

URBAN CLIMATE ‒ Field experiment and modelling studies on urban heat island tourban albedo
Very often urban climatologists give least importance to urban design variables in their modelling
approaches; as a result, urban designers tend to assess the climate parameters subjectively(Ali-Toudert and Mayer, 2006; Giridharan, 2007; Ooka, 2007). Model developers need to understandthe importance of urban design in improving urban climate, and develop models incorporating all
critical urban design variables at a very ﬁne spatial scale (Emmanuel et al., 2007). Further, considering
the complexities and uncontrollable changes in the urban environment, it is important to develop
context speciﬁc models rather than relying on generic models. However, these models need torepresent parameters in terms of the real setting. Further, they need to be validated for the real
physical settings. At times, monitoring and validating under real physical settings could be diﬃcult
due to resource, time and physical constraints. In these situations, scaled experimental models could
be the answer. Therefore, through this presentation I would like to highlight how on-sitemeasurement and scaled experimental models were used to address urban heat island to urban
albedo research with special focus on the EPSRC-funded urban albedo project.

32

Miriam Pfeiﬀer
Institute of Geosciences, CAU Kiel (Germany)

Professor of Paleontology and Historical Geology at the Institute of Geosciences, CAU Kiel, Germany.
Awarded MSc from Frankfurt University, Germany and PhD from Kiel University/GEOMAR in 1999 and
2002, respectively. Post-Doc at the GEOMAR 2003-2006. JSPS postdoctoral fellow at Hokkaido
University, Japan in 2006/7. Post-Doc, Habilitation and Heisenberg fellow at RWTH Aachen, before
joining CAU Kiel in 2018. Her research focusses on corals as paleoclimatic archives and their use forprojecting tropical climate variability. Committee member of priority program SPP2299 ‘Tropicalclimate variability and coral reefs’ (https://www.spp2299.tropicalclimatecorals.de/) funded by theGerman Science foundation (2022-2028).

Climate Past and Present: Corals as Monitors of Past and Current Tropical Climate
Variability
The rise of tropical sea surface temperatures driven by anthropogenic climate change is the greatest
threat to coral reef ecosystems, which will face irreversible damage even if warming is limited to 1.5°C.
In addition, warming in the tropics aﬀects the climate extremes such as droughts, ﬂoods andhurricanes. However, the instrumental record of tropical climate is limited to the past 150 years, andlacks spatial and temporal homogeneity. Instrumental biases during and after World War II aﬀect sea
surface temperature readings and aﬀect 20 th century warming estimates. Massive corals build
skeletons with annual density bands, comparable to tree rings. Geochemical data extracted from coralskeletons allow monthly reconstructions of temperature, hydrology and other environmental
parameters at a temporal resolution comparable to instrumental records. Moreover, as corals growcontinuously at rates >1cm per year and live for up to 500 years, while fossil corals are abundant on
tropical shores, recent climatic extremes are captured and can be evaluated in the context of natural
climate variability over the past millennia. The SPP 2299 ‘Tropical climate variability and coral reefs’
aims to improve projections of tropical climate and coral reef ecosystems, by combining proxy data,advanced statistical methods and earth system modelling.

33

Theme 2: Key Technologies for a Carbon-neutral
Environment
Yoshiyuki Kajikawa

Research Center for Urban Safety and Security, Kobe University (Japan)

Moderator

Takashi Kita
Vice President, Kobe University (Japan)

Takashi Kita is a Professor in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Graduate Schoolof Engineering, Kobe University, Kobe, Japan. He is also Vice President of Kobe University and Directorof the Oﬃce for Promoting SDGs. He obtained a Dr of Engineering from Osaka University, Osaka,
Japan, in 1991. In 1996, he was a visiting researcher in Professor H.-J. Queisser’s Laboratory at the
Max-Plank Institute, Stuttgart, Germany. His current interests include the epitaxial growth andmaterial physics of III‒V material-based quantum heterostructures, and semiconductor
nanostructures for new generation solar cells and novel light sources. He was a research member ofthe EU-Japan project “A new generation of concentrator photovoltaic cells, modules and systems”,
which organized by EC and NEDO (Japan) from 2011 to 2014.

Industry-government-academia collaborations for SDGs
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were adopted at the United Nations Sustainable
Development Summit in 2015. These SDGs are universal goals that developed countries including
Japan should tackle alongside developing countries for the beneﬁt of the international community.
There are 17 SDGs comprised of 169 targets that we should aim to achieve by 2030. The goals
represent pressing issues and aim to end poverty, save the earth, and enable people to live peacefuland fulﬁlling lives.
Kobe University’s SDGs Promotion Oﬃce was established in February, 2020 to contribute towards the
17 goals through our research expertise and educational activities. We also initiate
industry-government-academia collaborations and develop novel interdisciplinary research areas tofoster new value creation. With local communities and industries, we aim at establishing open
interaction, enabling SDG-related idea sharing and allowing outcomes to be smoothly implemented.
In order to achieve the SDGs, it is essential to harmonize innovative technologies and education witha diverse society. In this spirit, we promote (1) technological, industrial and societal innovation, (2)value creation and its implementation, (3) education for younger generations and virtuous cycles ofhuman resource development,(4) close cooperation with local communities, and (5) strong
international collaborations with people, institutions and organizations around the world.

34

Michel Cassir
Chimie ParisTech, PSL Research University (France)

Emeritus Professor at Chimie-Paris Tech, PSL Research University. Ph.D. in Analytical Chemistry from
University of Paris VI in 1977. Habilitation as Research Director in 1992. Education and research awards
from French University and Ministry of Research & Education. Professor for 9 years at the National
University of Mexico (UNAM). Head of the Lab. Electrochemistry, Chemistry of Interfaces & Modelingfor Energy. Responsible for education, research and international programs. Research focused on hightemperature fuel cells (MCFC, SOFC/PEFC/hybrid) and electrolysis cells (MCEC, SOEC), batteries, newmaterials for energy, ultrathin layers, electrochemistry for sensors and medical applications. 360
communications, conferences, or posters at scientiﬁc events (98 invited conferences). Authored 280
scientiﬁc publications, proceedings & book chapters. Invited Editor of publications including IJHE and
JPS, among others. Involved in large-scale scientiﬁc collaborations all over the world (including
Europe, Japan, South Korea, China, the USA and Latin America).

CO₂ Capture and Valorisation in Molten Carbonate-based electrolytes
CO2 emissions, representing 80% of global anthropogenic emissions, currently exceed 40 Gt per year;
it is therefore necessary to signiﬁcantly decrease them in order to control global warming. The key
challenge is the storage and/or the conversion of this molecule. The unique physicochemical
properties of molten carbonates make them among the most eﬃcient solvents to solubilize CO2 and,furthermore, to reduce it into valuable fuels such as CO, CH4 and C. This presentation gives a general
overview of the high temperature applications of such electroclytes, in particular the so-called Molten
carbonate Fuel Cell (MCFC), already a mature technology, which can be used as a reference device forabsorbing and exploiting CO2 molecules. Precisely determining the solubility of CO2 in various
molten carbonate eutectics is crucial for the development of electrolysis and carbon capture systems
and for the mechanistic understanding of CO2 behavior in such media. Reliable CO2 solubility values
were obtained by a manometric set-up in carbonate eutectic mixtures, obtaining in the best case asolubility of 10-1 mol.atm.L-1 at 650°C. Another notable trend is that CO2 solubility increases
alongside temperature in most eutectics. Some results of the co-electrolysis of water and carbon
dioxide are given, showing that in standard conditions the main product is a CO+H2 mixture. The
addition of moderate amounts of hydroxides to molten carbonates provokes a beneﬁcial eﬀect on theco-electrolysis. This overview on molten carbonate-based devices, together with a set of recent
experimental results will provide evidence of this research ﬁeld’s signiﬁcance and promising industrial
applications.

35

Minoru Mizuhata

Moderator

Graduate School of Engineering, Kobe University (Japan)

Minoru Mizuhata is a Professor in the Department of Chemical Science and Engineering, Graduate
School of Engineering, Kobe University, Kobe, Japan. He is also the one of the professors in
responsible for the operation of the Interface Science Research Center and the Brussels oﬃce. He
earned a PhD in Science from Kobe University in 1992. He worked at Osaka National Research Institutefrom 1992 to 1996 as a researcher of Laboratory Hydrogen Energy and studied the R&D of Polymer
Electrolyte Fuel Cells. In 1996, he moved Kobe University and was promoted to associate professor in
2005, and professor in 2011. He was a visiting researcher of Professor F. Faupel’s Laboratory of Kiel
University and Professor J. Maier’s Laboratory of Max-Plank Institute, Stuttgart, Germany in 1997. His
current interests include inorganic chemistry and material science for energy conversion. He has
written more than 200 papers and 25 patents.

CO₂ Separation and Absorption: Research Breakthroughs
Reducing the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere and curbing global warming is a common
challenge for all mankind. It is necessary not only to reduce CO2 emissions, which are the main causeof global warming, but also to construct a system that captures CO2, generates energy from it, andcirculates it. For CO2 recovery in places with high CO2 concentration, such as large-scale factories, it isnecessary to increase the eﬃciency of high-temperature-operating CO2 absorbers, and we have
improved this reaction rate by modifying the surfaces of conventional materials. Here, I will introduce
one of our research topics.
Lithium orthosilicate (Li4SiO4) is a ceramic CO2 absorbent with a large absorptive capacity (36.7
wt.%) and heat resistance properties. Li4SiO4 has applications as a separator in molten carbonate fuelcells, and as a direct CO2 absorbent for large-scale emission sources such as thermal power stations.
The absorption and desorption reaction equilibrium temperature of Li4SiO4 is around 993 K. This
study investigates the CO2 absorption behavior of Li4SiO4 at lower temperatures. Samples, thesurfaces of which were modiﬁed with ball milling under an Ar atmosphere, exhibited increased
Brunauer-Emmett-Teller surface areas. Electron spin resonance (ESR) spectroscopy indicated anincrease in the content of Si dangling bonds upon ball milling. Thermogravimetric-diﬀerential thermal
analysis indicated two diﬀerent CO2 absorption processes: chemisorption on the Li4SiO4 surface attemperatures below 773 K; and bulk diﬀusion at temperatures above 773 K. Isothermal analysis
indicated that ball milling and the addition of K2CO3 decreased the activation free energy.

36Noriko Shisa
Toyota Motor Europe (Japan)

Noriko Shisa is Technical Head of Technology Research Planning at the Technical Center of Toyota
Motor Europe (TME). She joined Japan’s Toyota Motor Corporation (TMC) in 2007. After a successfulcareer as a researcher in the ﬁeld of materials, she was transferred to the Technology Management
Department as Group Manager of the Research Planning Group from 2018. There her main
responsibilities were future research planning and academia-industry collaboration in TMC. Since
April 2021, she has been assigned to TME, mainly focusing onEuropean research planning based onher experience at TMC.

Sustainable Mobility - Towards Carbon Neutrality
At Toyota, sustainability has always been at the center of everything we do. The environment inparticular is part of our heritage and commitment. Through Kaizen, which means continuous
improvement, we have always strived to ﬁnd better ways to ensure people’s well-being andcontribute better solutions to society.
We are most closely linked to SDG No.13 ‒ Climate Action. Toyota supports the Paris Agreement, andwill continue to do its utmost to take on the challenge of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050. In 2015,
at the time of the Paris Agreement, we pioneered a corporate commitment to measurable change
through Toyota’s Environmental Challenge 2050. With our Environmental Challenge 2050, we arecommitted to making our entire operations, including manufacturing and services, sustainable.
We are developing our future plans knowing that Europe is leading the way towards carbon
neutrality, from a global perspective. Europe is also the most important partner in research anddevelopment for achieving carbon neutrality. At the end of this presentation, we will also introduce
our R&D activities that are being carried out in Europe.

Maitane Berecibar
Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)

Prof Dr Ir Maitane Berecibar is the Battery team leader in the MOBI research group at VUB. She is now
in charge of R&D innovation and strategy in the ﬁeld of batteries; novel materials, second life, state
estimations, recycling, safety, etc. As the team leader she focuses on developing new consortia,37

managing promising innovative projects and supervising her group. She obtained her PhD in
Engineering of Sciences at VUB in August 2017 titled “Development of an Accurate State of Health
Estimation Technique for Lithium-Ion Batteries”. Since then, she has worked as a senior researcher,grant writer and project manager at the MOBI research centre for H2020 and other projects related toenergy management transition. Additionally, Prof Berecibar is a key partner of the Battery2030+
initiative. She is also is coordinating the European project Bat4ever and is an oﬃcial member of theIEC standardization body (TC-69 and TC-21)

The Batteries of the Future
Batteries have become an indispensable product for society; they are being used in a variety of
products ranging from cellphones to electric vehicles. The most popular battery technologies are thelithium-ion batteries due to their high energy-and power-density as well as their long lifetime
compared to other types. Lithium batteries are the dominant type of battery technology used in EVs.
Many diﬀerent types of lithium batteries exist and they have various characteristics. The battery
characteristics deﬁne their speciﬁc energy (i.e., driving range), cycle life, power performance, safety,
etc. The next few years will see novel battery chemistries, compositions and production steps. In
predictive maintenance and reliability studies, the required stress will further improve the driving
range, environmental performance, and cost of vehicles. However, there are still challenges toovercome in applying novel topics such as artiﬁcial intelligence, sensor integration and self-repairingproperties to developing batteries of the future.

38

39

Interactive Workshop andBrokerage Event B
NATURAL SCIENCES & TECHNOLOGY
Minoru Mizuhata

Graduate School of Engineering, Kobe University (Japan)

Session leader

Hiroshi Suzuki
Graduate School of Engineering, Kobe University (Japan)

Professor of the Department of Chemical Science and Engineering, Kobe University, Japan. Awarded
Dr. Eng. in 1991, from Kyoto University, Japan. After working for Kyoto University as an instructor from1988 to 1991, he joined Hiroshima University as an associate professor from 1991 to 1998. His researchinterest is thermal media transportation. He has received awards from the Heat Transfer Society (1990,2019), the Society of Chemical Engineers (1990), and the Society of Rheology of Japan (2021). As thepresident of Japanese Society of Latent Heat Engineers, he was leading the Japanese researchers who
are working on thermal storage and latent heat transportation technologies.

Silica Hard-Shell Microcapsules Containing Phase Change Materials
Silica hard-shell microcapsules containing phase change materials have been developed so that they
can be applied to latent heat transportation systems. Silica microcapsules have advantages in terms of
their thermostability, mechanical toughness, resistance to chemicals, and weak adhesiveness to thewalls of ﬂow systems compared with polymer-shell microcapsules. In this talk, the thermal
characteristics of silica hard-shell microcapsules containing inorganic hydrates will be discussed. From
the results, it is found that the super-cooling phenomena of inorganic hydrates disappears inmicrocapsules. These results demonstrate that these microcapsules have many applications not only
to latent heat transportation but also to various kinds of thermal storage systems. The combination
dispersants of drag-reducing surfactants and polyvinyl alcohol was also developed to prevent the
sedimentation of the silica microcapsules. The microcapsule sedimentation was found to occur very
slowly in contrast to Stokes’ traditional theorem. The present microcapsules containing phase changematerials are promising materials for the realization of a low-carbon society.

40

Kentaro Kuratani
National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology(AIST)
Graduate School of Engineering, Kobe University (Japan)

Kentaro KURATANI is a Group Leader of the Advanced Electrochemical Device Research Group in the
National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), Japan. He is also a Visiting
Associate Professor of the Graduate School of Engineering at Kobe University, Japan. He obtained his
doctoral degree in engineering from Kobe University in 2005. Subsequently, he joined AIST andstarted his career. In 2021, he was promoted to group leader. His research focuses on materials
science in relation to the active materials of electrochemical devices.

Breakthrough Research in Material Technologies for Batteries
The demands to curb the emission of greenhouse gases (GHGs) increase every year. Renewableenergy, such as solar-power and wind-power, has the potential to reduce GHG emissions andconsequently the implementation of renewable energy is being accelerated worldwide. In Europe, forexample, almost 30% of electricity was generated via renewable energies as of 2015. The practicalusage of electric vehicles is considered to be another possible candidate for reducing GHG emissions.
In both cases, electrochemical devices including Lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) play an important role.
In this presentation, I will give an overview of research and development related to electrochemical
devices such as LIBs at AIST and introduce the new materials we have developed.

Marco Liserre
Kiel University (Germany)

Marco Liserre received the MSc and PhD degree in Electrical Engineering from the Bari Polytechnic(Italy), respectively in 1998 and 2002. He has been Associate Professor at Bari Polytechnic andProfessor in reliable power electronics at Aalborg University (Denmark) from 2012. Since 2013 he has
been Full Professor and holds the Chair of Power Electronics at Kiel University (Germany) where heleads a team of 25 researchers with a Power Electronics Laboratory, a Medium Voltage Laboratory anda Laboratory on Batteries and Energy Conversion, in cooperation with colleagues in material science.
He has lead in the last 7 years third-party projects for over 13 M€ (of which 5 % direct company
assignment).
Notably he was awarded an ERC Consolidator Grant (European Excellence Grants) for the project “The41

Highly Eﬃcient And Reliable smart Transformer (HEART), a new Heart for the Electric Distribution
System” in 2013.
He has published 500 technical papers (1/3 of them in international peer-reviewed journals) and abook, which received more than 42000 citations. Marco Liserre is listed in the ISI Thomson report on“The world’s most inﬂuential scientiﬁc minds” from 2014. He is fellow of IEEE and has received various
awards, including the IES 2009 Early Career Award, the IES 2011 Anthony J. Hornfeck Service Award,
and the 2018 IEEE-IES Mittelmann Achievement Award, which is the highest award of the IEEE-IES.

New technologies and materials as driver of tomorrow's power electronics
Technologies such as silicon and medium-frequency ferrites are reaching their limits and only
moderate gains can be expected from them in the future. New materials are therefore being actively
investigated to go beyond the current SOA in terms of eﬃciency, power density, reliability, etc.
Although these new technologies open new research and application ﬁelds, they can raise newconcerns, e.g. in terms of applicability, and be challenging to use; their optimal development
therefore calls for pluri-disciplinary research teams, involving both materials scientists and powerelectronics experts.
This presentation will oﬀer an overview, restricted to the component level, of current and emerging
technologies. It will cover magnetics, active components, integration & packaging technologies, andelectric energy storage systems, showing how materials under development are expected to boost
the current state-of-the art.

42

Parallel Session 3 10:30-13:30
ENABLING RESILIENT, CLIMATE-PREPARED SOCIETIESTheme1: Social Impact of Climate Change
Theme2: Local Adaptation to Global WarmingInteractive Workshop
and Brokerage Event C 14:45-16:15(SOCIAL SCIENCES & HUMANITIES)

43

Session 3: Enabling resilient, climate-prepared societies
Session 3 of this symposium, entitled 'Enabling resilient, climate-prepared societies’, brought together
researchers mainly from the social sciences and humanities to discuss various perspectives.
The session was divided into two parts, the ﬁrst of which was devoted to presentations anddiscussions on the common theme of ‘Social impacts of climate change’. Firstly, Mr. Karel Deneckere(VUB) analysed the impact of the Fukushima nuclear accident on public opinion and attitudes in
Belgium. Next, Mr. Kazuhiro Ota (Kobe University) introduced a case study on the impact of climatechange on poverty and migration in the Philippines, and discussed the importance and limitations of
SDGs. At the end of the ﬁrst half, Mr. Ginga Tamura (NHK) raised the issue of the media’s role intackling climate change, particularly in the context of the EU and Japan. Finally, Michel Claessens(European Commission and ULB) discussed the eﬀorts and response of scientists to the global crisis ofclimate change. Thus, the ﬁrst half of the session gave various stakeholders (such as citizens, scientists
and members of the media) the opportunity to actively exchange opinions and discuss how to
confront climate change.
The second half of the session, which was held on the general theme of community adaptation to
global warming, began with Koen Borghys (VUB) introducing empirical examples of local responses to
the SDGs in Brussels. Then Ms. Carina Veeckman (VUB) presented the results of an ongoing research
project on forward-thinking citizen science involvement in environmental monitoring and reporting.
Next, Mieko Kiyono (Kobe University) presented the results of a Japanese case study on community
resilience in response to climate change-related natural disasters. Finally, Marialena Nikolopoulou(University of Kent) discussed the adaptation of cities in the face of global warming and theimportance of urban planning. In the second half of the session, presentations were given on bothurban and suburban adaptation to global warming, and opinions were exchanged on future
adaptation measures.
In the afternoon of the session, the potential of educational programs for a wide range of people andthe direction of future collaborative research were explored. First, Mr. Koji Matsuoka (Kobe University)
introduced the ESD (Education for Sustainable Development) programme being developed at Kobe
University, and discussed the importance of activities for the practical realization of sustainable
development, including various environmental and social topics such as climate change. This wasfollowed by a lively exchange of views on the status of relevant educational programmes in Europe
and their development. As a continuation of the morning's discussions, the potential for thedevelopment of citizen science and its interaction with other related projects was explored.
Participants discussed the search for potential collaborators, and future joint research projects.
The interconnectedness of the presentations provided a very useful forum for the exchange of
information and conﬁrmed the existence of research projects with potential synergies. It also
provided insights into what Japan and the EU can do to address the major global issue of climatechange.

44

Parallel Session 3
Theme 1: Social Impact of Climate Change

Masayuki Sato

Moderator

Graduate School of Human Development and Environment, Kobe
University (Japan)

Masayuki Sato is a Professor at Graduate School of Human Development and Environment, Kobe
University, Japan. He received his Ph.D. in Economics in 2006 from the Graduate School of Economics,
Kyoto University. After receiving Ph.D. he has worked for Graduate School of Global Environmental
Studies, Kyoto University as assistant professor, Field Science Education and Research Center asassociate professor. He moved to Kobe University in 2012. He was a Visiting Scholar at Department ofLand Economy, University of Cambridge during 2019-2020. His research interests are on the economic
valuation of the environment and ecosystem services related to sustainability issues.

Karel Deneckere
Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)

I am a guest lecturer at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) and Université Saint Louis (USL), both inBrussels, Belgium. I obtained my PhD degree in the winter of 2020 with my dissertation on the publicdebate on nuclear power in Belgium. I worked as a teaching assistant and PhD researcher at the VUB
from 2013. Prior to that, I was working on a pre-doctoral project on energy issues in Belgium at the
University of Antwerp. I have a MA in communication studies (VUB), a Msc. in sustainable
development & human ecology (VUB) and a licentiate in History (Ghent University).

Nuclear power’s trembling foundations: A case study of the Belgian public debate in
the aftermath of the Fukushima nuclear accident
Contrary to some other countries, the large-scale nuclear accident at Fukushima (2011) did not really45

pose an immediate existential threat to nuclear power in Belgium. Seemingly, the large-scale accident
did not provoke more than a passing uproar in the public debate. The industry conveniently repeatedtheir well-rehearsed message that Belgian climate commitments make nuclear power unavoidable(e.g. Bickerstaﬀ, Lorenzoni, Pidgeon, Poortinga, & Simmons, 2008; Doyle, 2011), leaving many of its
critics stunned. This paper characterizes the Belgian public debate on nuclear power as an ongoing
discursive struggle for hegemony. Generally, it seeks to reconstruct the discourses on nuclear powerthat circulated in the Belgian public debate. More speciﬁcally, it looks at how ‘the environment’ isarticulated within these discourses. For this purpose, it uses discourse-theoretical analysis (DTA)(Carpentier & De Cleen, 2007), which combines Laclau and Mouﬀe’s (1985) discourse theory withmethodological guidelines from critical discourse analysis (Wodak & Meyer, 2009) and qualitative
content analysis (Charmaz, 2006). My analysis reveals that the discursive struggle took place on twolevels of abstraction. On a more explicit level, the nuclear cause seemed to emerge from thecontroversy unharmed. On a more implicit level, however, the analysis reveals a whole diﬀerent
picture. Here, it shows that the accident contributed to a shift in how the public understands human’s
relationship with the non-human world. While the ‘modernist’ ontology gradually erodes, analternative ecological ontology is emerging.

Kazuhiro Ota
Graduate School of Human Development and Environment, Kobe
University (Japan)

Professor at the Graduate School of Human Development and Environment, Kobe University, Japan.
PhD from Hitotsubashi University, Japan. He works on Development Studies and Area Studies of thePhilippines. His research interests are poverty issues and community development. He is the author of‘Migration and the Nation-State: The Contradictions of Globalization’ in K. Sakai & N. Lanna eds.
Migration Governance in Asia: Multi-level Analysis, Routledge (forthcoming).

Climate Change’s Impact on Poverty and Migration
The impacts of climate change vary between countries and social groups. In Asia, there are several
counties that are greatly aﬀected by natural disasters caused by climate change, such as India, China
and the Philippines. In many cases, the poor are severely impacted. The problems triggered bydisasters, however, usually stem from the structural social contradictions. This paper discusses how
climate change impacts poverty and the poor, focusing on the Philippines. It criticizes rapid economic
development strategies that result in social and environmental consequences. In addition, it looks at
the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) from a critical viewpoint. It may be impossible toovercome the current issues even if all the SDGs are achieved.

46Ginga Tamura
NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation) (Japan)

As a correspondent at NHK, Japanese public television, Ginga Tamura has been covering international
politics, especially international negotiations on climate change and environmental issues, as part of
the International News Division. He reported on COP24 in Poland in 2018 and COP25 in Spain in 2019.
He has frequently covered and reported on various topics such as “climate justice”, “climate tech” and“role of youths in climate change”.
He was awarded an MA from Tokyo University of Foreign Studies in 2013 after completing hisbachelor degree at Kobe University in 2011, which included a 1-year exchange at Université de Paris X.

Role of Mass-media to tackle climate change and its diﬀerence between Europe andJapan
While the social movement “Global School Strike” initiated by Greta Thunberg, a Swedish girl,mobilised thousands of people in European countries in February 2019, only 12 people gathered forthe ﬁrst demonstration of “Fridays for Future Japan” in the same February. The Guardian, a major daily
newspaper in the UK, updated their style guide in 2019 to describe climate change as a “climate
crisis”, however almost all Japanese media outlets still use the expression “global warming”, and don’teven say “climate change”, while posting less articles about the issue.
What are those diﬀerences?
In addition to historical and cultural factors, I focus on a global survey about people’s views on climatechange. These results show that Japanese people are more reluctant to take measures against climatechange, compared to the global average, which may explain the diﬀerences in people’s attitudes, andwould be a reason why the mass-media may have to undertake diﬀerent strategies to raise awarenessof this issue in Japan.

Michel Claessens
European Commission and Free University of Brussels (Belgium)

Michel Claessens (Ph.D. ULB, Brussels) is a retired EU oﬃcial and professor of science communication
at the Free University of Brussels. He has published 15 books and about 35 articles and book chapterson European science and technology. He is an active member of international networks on science47

communication (PCST, ESOF, etc.) and a frequent speaker at international conferences (Chinese
Association for Science Communication, AAAS, TEDx, etc). He is currently developing an international
alliance to promote science culture together with 14 teams of experts. His latest book, “The Scienceand Politics of Covid-19”, has just been published by Springer.

How Should Scientists Tackle Global Crises: The Climate Test-Case
The IPCC, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, is the most remarkable initiative that has
successfully contributed towards building sustainable links between science and policy. It has been
publishing periodic reports and authoritative assessments on the whole issue of global warming since1988. The international group has established itself as a model for technoscientiﬁc governance, inparticular by combining scientiﬁc and political skills from a policy- and decision-making perspective.
Hence, the IPCC has become a suitable model for other international expertise projects, such as the“Intergovernmental Scientiﬁc and Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services” (IPBES),
established in 2012 by 94 governments.
Unfortunately, these lessons were not taken into account in the management of the Covid-19 crisis,
during which governments promoted national approaches rather than international cooperation.
Cooperation between scientists and politicians still needs to be improved. I will discuss the conditions
for setting up a suitable international framework which would serve as a “natural” basis for tacklingplanetary crises. This would be the basis for facilitating long-term interaction between politicians andscientists, a mechanism for co-constructing political action by scientiﬁc validation and a basis forinternational cooperation.

48

Theme 2: Local Adaptation to Global Warming

Leo Van Audenhove

Moderator

Department of Communication Studies, Vrije Universiteit Brussel(Belgium)

Leo Van Audenhove is a professor and head of the Department of Communication Studies at Vrije
Universiteit Brussel. He is a researcher at iMEC-SMIT ‒ Studies on Media, Innovation and Technology,
as well as an extra-ordinary professor at the University of the Western Cape. In 2013, he wasinstrumental in setting up the Knowledge Centre for Digital and Media Literacy in Flanders, of which
he subsequently became the director. It was established by the government as an independent
centre to promote digital and media literacy in Flanders. His research focuses on media and data
literacy, digital inclusion, and ICT4D.

Koen Borghys
Studies in Media, Innovation and Technology (SMIT), Vrije
Universiteit Brussel (VUB) (Belgium)

Koen Borghys is a PhD researcher at Studies in Media, Innovation and Technology (SMIT), Vrije
Universiteit Brussel. His PhD focuses on the monitoring of progress by local actors (both public andprivate) within the Brussels Capital Region towards the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The project combines several of his personal interests: cities and municipalities (the local level),data-driven policymaking and sustainability. Before his PhD Koen was already working as a researcher
at SMIT, focusing on smart city related projects with local governments. Koen obtained a Master ofLaws and a Master of Science in Economics at Ghent University.

Monitoring Sustainable Development Goals: The Role of the Local Level in Brussels
The 17 Substainable Development Goals (SDGs) were adopted by the UN in 2015. Together with 169
sub-targets, they are part of the Agenda 2030 and form the international sustainability framework forthe coming decade. The aim is to achieve global sustainable development by 2030, thereby equally
addressing 5 pillars of sustainable development: people, planet, prosperity, partnership and peace.
Although written for national governments, the Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development addresses

49every actor worldwide - (local) governments, companies, educational institutions, organizations andindividual citizens - to achieve these goals together.
To monitor progress towards the goals, the UN also formulated one or more ‘global’ indicators foreach of the 169 SDG sub-targets. However, local entities have diﬀerent priorities and ambitions tonational governments and work within a diﬀerent context. In order to make the implementation of
the global goals workable, it is necessary to give a local interpretation of the international framework.
Within the PhD Project ‘SDG in ACTION’ the existing global framework will be adapted to local entities
within the Brussels Capital Region and a monitoring tool will be developed to conduct a follow-up on
the SDGs.

Carina Veeckman
imec-SMIT, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)

Since 2011, Carina Veeckman has been a senior researcher at imec, SMIT-Vrije Universiteit Brussel(VUB) in Belgium (Ms. Communication Sciences). She has an extensive track record as a project
manager for European and national funded projects and helps with the proposal preparation andwriting. She has a particular interest in co-creation, citizen science, living labs and social innovation
platforms. She is part of the ‘Data, Governance & Communities’ Unit at SMIT and serves as principal
investigator on citizen science with two recent science communication handbooks. She is also a board
member of Scivil, the Knowledge Centre for Citizen Science in Flanders.

Citizen Science for Environmental Monitoring and Policy: Best Practices
This presentation is about the application of citizen science to environmental monitoring andreporting, and its opportunities and challenges. Citizen science, or the participation of citizens inscientiﬁc research, is not a new concept. However, ICT developments and growing calls from theEuropean Commission for public involvement and transparent policymaking has created newopportunities (e.g., Green Deal; Horizon Europe, pathway 6). The data collected through citizen
science initiatives can contribute to the knowledge base for SDG monitoring and implementation,
however, the uptake in policy by government administrations is still low. Based on interviews andworkshops with the 13 Flemish center cities (Belgium), some key insights about the potential of
citizen science at the local level are illustrated, such as the increase of citizen involvement inprioritized issues. Based on the results, a ten-step roadmap for developing a citizen science policy will
also be shared in order to promote the uptake of citizen science by policy makers.

50

Mieko Kiyono
Graduate School of Human Development and Environment, Kobe
University (Japan)

Dr. Mieko Kiyono is Associate Professor at the Graduate School of Human Development andEnvironment, Kobe University, Japan. She obtained a PhD from Kyoto University, Japan in 2009. After
working for Kyoto University as a post doctor, she joined Kobe University in 2013 as an assistantprofessor at the Center for Regional Partnership in the Graduate School of Agricultural Science, Kobe
University until 2015. From 2015 to 2017, she was also involved in policy making as a local
government employee of Sasayama City. She currently serves as an advisor on the agricultural andrural environment of Tamba-Sasayama City.

Adaptation to Climate Change: Community Resilience to Natural Disasters in Rural
Area, JAPANIt is widely acknowledged that global warming signiﬁcantly aﬀects the features of extreme events(Imada et al., 2020). Imada et al. also found that the probability of seasonal heavy rainfall in theregions where the July 2017 Northern Kyushu Torrential Rains and the July 2018 Torrential Rains
occurred has signiﬁcantly increased with the progression of global warming. Disasters are expected tooccur more frequently in the future, and it is necessary to focus on how local communities canfunction in terms of disaster prevention, mitigation and recovery. This presentation will focus on acommunity in the Kuma River basin of Kumamoto Prefecture that was aﬀected by the 2020 torrential
rains in northern Kyushu. In rural areas of Japan, aging and depopulation have become a serious issue.
In addition, the disaster recovery process was carried out diﬀerently compared to the normal recovery
process, due to people practicing self-restraint regarding social activities in order to prevent
coronavirus infection. On the other hand, the ﬁeld survey revealed that the recovery process was
triggered by agriculture, which is similar to the trend after the Kumamoto earthquake in 2016. This
presentation will reveal how local communities living along large rivers are enhancing their resilience.

51

Marialena Nikolopoulou
University of Kent (UK)Marialena Nikolopoulou is Professor of Sustainable Architecture and Deputy Head of School at theKent School of Architecture & Planning, University of Kent. She has extensive experience inmonitoring of microclimatic conditions and post-occupancy surveys in diﬀerent operational contexts,
and is on the Steering Committee of the CIBSE Guide A on Environmental Design. Her work on
outdoor comfort has received awards from diverse bodies (RIBA, International Society ofBiometeorology) and best paper prizes, and has inﬂuenced understanding of the topic across theworld. She is currently the UK lead for the European H2020 Marie Sklodowska-Curie Industrial
Doctorate ‘Solutions for Outdoor Climate Adaptation’ and Editor of the International Journal ‘Building
and Environment’.

Thermal comfort as a commodity; what does thermal resilience mean
The recent COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the need for inclusive, high quality, open space, as
essential for supporting liveability and resilience. The talk will focus on understanding how theabstract concept of thermal comfort, an inherent characteristic of space, is aﬀecting the use of andactivities in open urban spaces. It will explore the mechanisms through which our adaptive capacity isenhanced, from conscious actions to a range of parameters in the contextual framework of
psychological adaptation, temporality and cultural norms, proceeding to discuss how these can be
employed in design. Ultimately, it will highlight the need for adaptive capacity and thermal resilienceat the individual level, as well as spatial scale, supporting environmental diversity. In a warming
climate and in the wake of a global health pandemic, outdoor comfort becomes an importantcommodity, where the design of open spaces has the potential to play a critical role not only forclimate regulation and energy, but also for health, live ability and social cohesion.

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Interactive Workshop andBrokerage Event C
SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIESLeo Van Audenhove

Session leader

Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)

Patrick Vittet-Philippe

Session leader

Kobe University Brussels European Centre (Belgium)

Patrick Vittet-Philippe is a recently retired EC oﬃcial, with a special interest in international S&T
cooperation, science communication and science diplomacy. Before joining the Commission, hetaught at Trinity College Dublin and Merton College Oxford and was attaché de recherche at the
French CNRS. He spent 14 years in the French Diplomatic Service, as press and cultural attaché in Tel
Aviv, London and New York. After a period in the European television industry, he joined the EC as
expert-adviser in Information Society technologies and the digital economy, representing theinstitution in key international fora and conferences. He moved in 2001 to DG Research andInnovation as Press and Communication Oﬃcer, responsible, in particular, for commissioning TV
magazines on EU research (e.g. Futuris on Euronews) and public engagement in science. In 2011 hebecame Head of the Japan and Russia Desks, where he organized the ‘EU-Russia Year of Science’, andwas directly involved in the preparation of the S&T chapters of EU-Russia and EU-Japan Summits. He
was appointed as adviser to Kobe University Brussels European Centre in 2017, focusing on thedevelopment of joint research projects and academic cooperation between Europe and Japan.

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Policy Keynote
Ms. Elina Bardram
Director ﬀ, Directorate General for Climate Action,
European Commission (EU)It's a great pleasure to be with you and share some thoughts about the relevance and the signiﬁcanceof the EU-Japan Green Alliance in the context of prompting momentum at a global level ahead of
COP 26 that will take place in Glasgow in less than 10 days.
I would like to begin by putting the recent intensiﬁcation in the EU’s bilateral relations with Japan into
the global context. Urgent action has hardly ever been as necessary as today. The Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) conﬁrmed in its 6th report that the world is warming rapidly due tohuman inﬂuence and underlined yet again the need for urgent action. Action needs to be scaled up
and made more comprehensive. The report set out the need to reduce CO2 emissions to net zero, andscale up action to protect our natural carbon sinks.
Ahead of the COP26, all countries, and in particular all major economies need to demonstrateenhanced ambition of the Paris Agreement commitments. The EU-Japan Green Alliance by 2050 has
been already communicated by all the G7 countries and several other economies. The transition ispicking up speed but there are very important economies that are yet to make their intentions
known, including China and India. We are very much aware in the EU that to reach the Paris goals
globally, we cannot act alone. We must motivate all countries to join a global race to carbon neutrality‒ and join forces with those partners that embarked on similar pathways to climate neutrality by
mid-century and enhanced 2030 ambition.
The EU and Japan are ideally positioned to be in the ﬁrst row of this ‘ambition coalition’ - which alsomeans reaping ﬁrst mover advantages and as major economies, EU and Japan have particularresponsibility to demonstrate progress on the implementation of our climate objectives under theParis Agreement. This transition should leave no citizens behind because without the public support
governments can only go so far.
The EU has been working closely with Japan for many years, with Strategic Partnership Agreementand Economic Partnership Agreement as key tools framing our cooperation, but our recent Green
Alliance opens a full spectrum of areas where closer cooperation between the EU and Japan will be
beneﬁcial, both to reinforce our partnership but also to set the tone for the rest of the world and share
our experiences in terms of policies, economics and technologies with those that have less capacity toembark on this transition. Both the EU and Japan are stepping up their domestic eﬀorts on climate
and green transition across the board, developing and implementing policies to achieve their 2050
target, and enhance the 2030 ambition. We continue to look at policies even outside of the United
Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) because it makes economic sense. Dealing with CO2 emissions is cheaper than dealing with the negative consequences of climate

54

change. Climate change is not only the business of environmentalists but also budget makers, urban
planners, agriculture and forestry. There is no sector of the economy that cannot be involved in overall
eﬀorts.
The EU Green Deal is our EU roadmap towards climate neutrality by 2050 and the EUs new growthstrategy. The European Climate Law adopted in June enshrines into law the goal set out in theEuropean Green Deal ‒ for Europe’s economy and society to become climate neutral by 2050. The
European Climate Law also sets the new net greenhouse gas emissions reduction target of at least-55% by 2030, compared to 1990 levels. With the EU Climate Law and the package of legislative
proposals presented in July 2021 ‘Fit for 55 package’, the EU is taking decisive and bold action towards
climate neutrality by 2050.
The Green Alliances between the EU and Japan is still in its infancy so we need to see how we
operationalize that. It is important that we have the necessary platforms to bring policy makers, civilsociety and businesses together to accelerate the cooperation. We also expect that the major policy
updates on both sides needed to align previous sectoral policies with the more ambitious 2030 target
will be forthcoming in a very frequent sequence. The EU and Japan are making serious eﬀorts tocombat climate change and are also contributors to climate ﬁnance that delivers on the global
solidarity and the goals that have been committed to in the context of the UNFCCC agreement.
As such, we have a strong interest for the EU and Japan to join forces in the context of our external
eﬀorts and action on climate change, including through joint projects and initiatives that would help
accelerate transition in third countries. One of the areas we deﬁnitely want to look at is thecooperation with other Asian and African countries as well as the paciﬁc.
We are looking forward to the COP26 and moving ahead with the ﬁnalization of the outstanding
negotiation items such as article 6 on carbon markets, enhanced transparency framework andenhancing or kicking oﬀ the discussions on the post-2025 goal. But it is clear that the COP26, as anyother COP, is not going to deliver alone. It is not the international climate conference that delivers thesafety zone but the action that takes place in the countries, - action driven by the governments
assuming responsibility and assuring their citizen that someone has control and responsibility ofwhere we will ﬁnd ourselves in 10, 20 and 30 years time when I hope we will be living in a net zeroglobal economy that's safer for all of us.
To conclude the Green Alliance is an important step forward in our bilateral cooperation and we also
hope it to be a model for the EU's engagement with like-minded partners that have assumed
equivalent level of ambition and determination and remains committed to making that work not justin the bilateral context but also as an inspiration for the broader global community.
Thank you.

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Closing Remarks
Tamotsu Nakamura
Executive Vice-President, Kobe University (Japan)

Distinguished guests, distinguished scholars, colleagues, ladies and gentlemen;
It was a great pleasure for me to join you at this symposium today.
On behalf of Kobe University, I would like to express my sincere gratitude for your support andparticipation in this event. It was the ﬁrst time that we have held this symposium in a hybrid format. I
really appreciate every single eﬀort done by the staﬀ there in Brussels and here in Kobe. Although
there may have been some technical problems, I believe everyone was able to fully participate in andenjoy this event. In addition, I would particularly like to thank online participants for staying until theend, considering how late it is in Japan.
I am quite sure that the excellent presentations and active discussions that took place in each session
and workshop. I strongly hope that they will serve as a stepping stone to future exchanges andcollaborations. Today’s symposium has been an opportunity to hear about various fascinating
research projects and I believe that this has inspired many of you. However, funding is very importantfor developing joint research. Tomorrow’s follow-up workshop is designed to complement today’s
symposium by introducing framework programmes that European and Japanese researchers canutilize. Our oﬃce of Research and Management will host the event with VUB as well as other Japanese
universities. I very much hope that you will also take part in tomorrow’s event.
Kobe University’s long-term vision is to further advance and develop as a “global hub for themultidisciplinary co-creation of research and education that cultivates profound knowledge andoutstanding innovators”. Since April, we have been cultivating a diverse and inclusive environment
under President Fujisawa and the new administration. Promoting international partnerships withother organisations is indispensable in order for us to realise this great vision. We are determined tostrengthen our collaborative relationships with the VUB and other European partners who have kindly
supported our activities and increased our presence in Europe. I am very grateful for your continued
warm support and I’m looking forward to working with you more closely.
I’d like to thank you all once again for participating in today’s symposium. Hopefully it will be possible
to see all of you in person next year.
Thank you very much.

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Jeremy Carette
Dean for Europe, University of Kent (UK)

Honorable guests, distinguished delegates, colleagues,
My name is professor Jeremy Carrette. I'm the dean for Europe at the university of Kent. The university
has been delighted to support the 11th annual joint symposium organized by our close partners,
Kobe University and the VUB. I'd like to thank all of those who have made this event possible today.
Climate change can only be tackled in a cross-disciplinary way. Collaboration is at the heart of ourchallenge to address these issues and our strength against the magnitude of the challenge is working
together. Today we've heard from experts from across the humanities, social science, and hardsciences drivers of action through their commitment to research. Symposiums such as today's eventare vital in presenting solutions and promoting a cross-pollination of ideas and demonstrating that
there is hope in the action we take together. Universities have a crucial role in forming and driving up
the partnerships and making research have the impact in the world through its engagements withbusiness, industry, governments and ensuring that higher education oﬀers its insights into thesolutions.
Kent recognizes how important our European and global connections are. Witnessed by our presencein Brussels, we have our Brussels School of International Studies which has been here for over 20
years, part of our international commitment and part of our development of the relationships forresearch and teaching. At a regional level, Kent leads on the climate and emergency strand of theinter-regional internationalization initiative, the 3i University Network comprising of four universities
in the transmanche, English channel, and north sea area newly created to intensify collaboration
opportunities and utilize the combined strengths of research academic and professional training
administration and infrastructure to ﬁnd solutions to common problems and challenges in this region.
Reﬂecting on our links with Kobe and VUB, we have been privileged to work with these institutions formany years through our exchange and research collaborations as neighbours in Brussels. With ourshared values, a belief in the strength of working together for the common good the power ofeducation and the extricable connection between research and the hope for the future. We are proud
to be your partner. On behalf of the university of Kent, I would like to thank Kobe Brussels center andthe VUB for inviting us to be part of this event. The connections made here today will make adiﬀerence in the future. Success in tackling climate change and the common challenges that face theworld to today are only achieved by working together. And I look forward to future collaborations inaddressing climate change and making our planet a safer place.
Thank you.

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Hugo Thienpont
Vice-Rector, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)

Mr. Ambassado
Excellencies
Dear colleagues
Ladies and gentlemen
It’s an honor for me as Vice Rector of innovation and industry relations of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel
to close this 11th Kobe University Brussels European Center symposium. I am indeed the last speaker
who is standing between you and the networking reception and the long-awaited sake testing.
My colleagues, the Executive Vice President professor Tamotsu Nakamura from Kobe university andthe Dean for Europe of university Kent professor Jeremy Carrette have already given a clear summaryof what the symposium on green horizons and sustainable futures has brought forward, namely that
it is absolutely necessary and urgent to jointly create a global green economy to develop
breakthrough technologies for climate solutions and to enable resilient climate prepared societies.
The key message which is also my key message for today is that we need to do this together and in aninterdisciplinary, multidisciplinary and cross-disciplinary manner. We need to join forcesinternationally to overcome the earth threatening issues that have been and are continuously being
created on a daily basis still now. So it is only by teaming up and by nurturing and facilitating
collaborations between our best researchers, scientists, engineers, and decision makers that we will
be able to turn the tide to regain a green horizon for mother earth and to create a sustainable future
for the generations to come.
And on behalf of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel I would like to thank the organizers of this symposium
and in particular our Kobe and Kent colleagues for their great and professional work as well as thejoint producers for setting up this great programme. A big word of thanks also goes to all the keynote
speakers of today who gave inspiring and motivating talks to all the panel moderators and panel
members for their lively discussions and for the new insights they gave us and, of course, to all of theattendees of this symposium who stayed with us until this very late hour certainly from the point ofview of our Japanese colleagues.
I am convinced that this symposium will inspire all of us to keep going and to relentlessly pursue agreener and a sustainable future. The joint eﬀorts of Japan and Europe can most certainly provide amajor contribution to this beautiful objective and let us, therefore, continue to join forces to exchange
researchers, share ideas, share results, and jointly develop novel technologies for the better world tocome.
The best and the fastest way to turn my wishes into reality is to start making plans in the upcoming
network reception and seal your intentions with a fantastic drink. I, therefore, invite you now to the58networking reception and the sake tasting. I sincerely hope that we can all meet in 2022 during a live
meeting again.
Arigatou gozaimasu. Thank you all.

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Edited and published by

Institute for Promoting International Partnerships

Kobe University
1-1, Rokkodai-cho, Nada-ku, Kobe, 657-8501 Japan
E-mail: intl-relations@office.kobe-u.ac.jp