Couple of months ago, I got the opportunity of visiting Japan's largest coal-fired Hekinan Thermal Power Plant. It is situated on the Mikawa bay located in Aichi prefecture (state) near Hekinan city, 40 km south of Nagoya, the city of Toyota. The station was installed by the Chubu Electric Power Co. which supplies electricity to an area of 37.78 × 104 km 2 .
Hekinan has 5 units and total power generation capacity of 4100 MW, making this the largest coal-fired power station in Japan and one of the largest in the world.
Within the 30-km radius of the power station, approximately 2 million people live. A crucial mission for the plant was “to preserve the earth's environment for future generations”. It has taken plenty of environmental measures by installing the latest equipment which led to enhance the thermal efficiency of the plant to reduce smoke emission, water emission and noise very effectively. They have done their outmost to protect the environment in a variety of ways. To hear and meet the local demand, the company involved the neighbouring people while conducting Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and disclosed every report to them from time to time.
In the EIA process so many measures were identified to keep the local environment most attractive. One of the significant measures was to consider the local aesthetic values and community facilities. This eventually created site attraction. Now the place is not only important for the large scale power plant but also for tourism and fishing facilities. The facilities that the company attributed for the community are called “Hekinan Tantopia” meaning Electricity Greenery Environment. The aesthetic values and community facilities that were taken into consideration are: the traditional yacht sailing, fishing facilities, creation of electric power museum, healing garden and eco-park.
On the Mikawa Bay sailing yacht is historically very popular. So the design of the power station is made in such a way that it looks like a sailing yacht. Use of aesthetic funnels and the standardization of colors and design of the buildings were matching a yacht.
The plant site was also important for the people who love fishing. So to compensate the sentiment of the community, company has made a “fishing park” near the northern water outlet of the power station.
The Healing Garden, situated to the south of the Electric Power Museum, has “healing and communication” as its theme. The garden features a large central lawn, flowerbeds, a bird lake, a chrysanthemum garden, a water garden and a herb garden.
South-east of the Healing Garden site has been made most appealing to the visitors by creating an Eco-Park with “ecological afforestation” method. approximately 25% of the area of the power station planted with trees which has created a green belt. Visitors can observe so many wild birds and insects in the park.
Hekinan power plant is a unique example which can serve as a model for the successful conservation of environment as well as a good lesson EIA involving people -- how to accommodate of local aesthetic values and community facilities.
Md. Billal Hossain is a Director (Administration) of the Department of Environment.
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