ECCJ implemented the JICA Energy Conservation training program for the Chilean Copper Industry
Under the instruction and financial support of the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), the Energy Conservation Center, Japan (ECCJ) implemented an energy conservation training program between August 28 and September 8, 2017 giving guidance in Japanese energy conservation policies and technologies to 16 trainees from Chile (comprising government officials, private industry groups, and private enterprise workers).
The trainees who visited Japan were mainly from Chilean government institutions in charge of energy conservation promotion and from enterprises involved in copper manufacturing, which is a major Chilean industry consuming a large amount of electricity. The objective of the training was to gain an understanding of the energy conservation policies and activities in Japan and to use it as a reference for activities in Chile.
1. Program configuration
Specifically, the program was organized by setting the separate objectives shown below.
- To gain an understanding of the general energy conservation policies and measures in Japan.
- To gain an understanding of energy conservation activities in the mining and manufacturing industries in Japan.
- To gain an understanding of the activities for energy conservation in Japanese copper smelting plants.
- To investigate the possibility of introducing Japanese energy conservation activities (policies, systems and technologies) into the policies and into copper industry-related enterprises in Chile.
2. Implementation details
Information on energy conservation in Japan was provided in stages, starting with the provision of information about Japanese basic policies, which is followed by the trends in the mining and manufacturing industries, and then the trends in the copper industry and the energy conservation activities in copper plants.
Many Japanese enterprises export products for the production processes in Chile’s copper manufacturing industry, and many of them also kindly gave introductions to technology from the viewpoint of energy conservation.
Additionally, site visits were made to three representative Japanese copper smelting plants, where the trainees learned about energy conservation technologies in the copper industry.
In particular, many of the trainees mentioned that they were greatly impressed by the systematic energy conservation proposal-making activities based on the small group activities at Japanese plants.