Energy Security in Cold Climate Region

Energy is playing an increasingly important role in modern society. It can be said that it is the most popular topic for research. Now we often discuss topics such as how to develop new energy sources and how to save energy, but we rarely hear about how we should use energy or rebuild energy system in some emergency situations, especially in natural disasters occur frequently time. For a more complete understanding of energy, this semester I took the Energy Security in Cold Climate Region course.

The Energy Security in Cold Climate Region course is about how we should deal with energy security and disaster prevention in the cold district. To compare with hot climate region, the cold climate will have much more damage for people by freezing. And also, it will be much more difficult to build a stable energy system (like power network) because of strong wind and frozen temperature.  The course covers the understanding about energy security in cold climate, disaster recovery assistance, influence of covid-19 on energy security, damage on Atsuma electric power plant and electric network caused by eastern Iburi earthquake and DoHUG game.

About energy security, we don’t have an exact definition for now. But we can describe that the energy security is ensuring the uninterrupted availability of energy sources at an affordable price and dealing with timely investments to supply energy in line with economic developments and environmental needs for long-term considering. So, it’s a little different with the first image came to my mind when I saw the tittle of the course.

 By professor’s introducing, I knew the Greenland the currently the most advanced environmental protection country for the 70% electricity produced by hydropower and so on. About the natural disaster, it not only brings us intuitive negative effects such as the collapse of buildings, but also increases survival pressure during power outages what we didn’t usually think of and notice. From the Damage on Atsuma electric plant and Electric network, it’s easy to understand how electrical flow go and generate electricity systems run. Also, we learn a lot of experience about the natural disaster experience that happened in the whole Hokkaido Japan. From numerous data, we can know that major earthquakes often occur in winter, which has also increased our attention to energy security. I also have a new understand of Sapporo city from energy system aspect. For example, the direct water supply in Sapporo City ensures that water can be supplied normally even during power outages. Of course, part of the success of this water supply method is also due to the natural conditions of Sapporo. At the same time, the example of the renovation of Hokkaido University Hospital showed us that garbage transportation is also an important issue when disasters occur.

By playing the Dohug game we applied the knowledge and experience explained by professors into the running a simulated shelter. And summed up the game experience, put forward the ideas for the renovation of energy and evacuation and made a speech based on this.

At the same time, we also learned about the latest developments in pandemic diseases and indoor environment health. We learned how Covid-19 is spread, ventilation recommendations, new considerations for calculating fresh air volume, and new information combined with the current situation. This has helped both my research content and the lives of each of us. This is a very precious opportunity to have directly communicate with many outstanding professors. Especially from me, who lived in and study the cold climate region, it expanded my vision of research and in life about energy. I hope we can continue to have opportunities to communicate with professors in the future. And I hope that after Covid-19 is properly handled, the course can resume the previous field exchanges, and we can cooperate and discuss with more students from different cultures and countries. Both Hokkaido and Russia are in a cold climate region. I believe there must be many common issues regarding energy and there will be more opportunities for cooperation.