4.2 Law concerning rational use of energy
(1) Objective
(2) Energy covered by the Law
(3) Basic policies and obligations of energy users
(4) Measures for factories
| 1) | Guidelines for business operators The Minister of International Trade and Industry shall establish and announce guidelines for business operators who use energy in their factories and other business locations, concerning the rationalization of fuel combustion, matters relating to the recovery and utilization of waste, and the targets in the rationalization of energy use, and measures to attain the targets, for proper and effective rationalization of energy use in factories. It is intended that the basic matters stated in the basic policies serve as guidelines, to be referred to by business operators when they formulate concrete measures for proper and effective rationalization of energy use in factories. |
| 2) | Guidance and advice When deciding that guidance or advice is necessary to ensure effective implementation of rational ener-gy use in factories, the Minister of International Trade and Industry or the minister with regulatory authority over the sector to which the factory belongs may give its operator such guidance or advice while taking into consideration the guidelines. |
| 3) | 1st class designated energy management factories Concerning the factories which are used for manufacturing or other businesses listed in Government Ordinance (mining, and supply of electric power, gas or heat) and which consume large amounts of fuel or electric power (consuming more than 3,000 kL of fuel per year in terms of crude oil or more than 12 GWh of electric power per year), the Minister of International Trade and Industry may designate any of them as a "1st class designated energy management factory" since the promotion of rational energy use is particularly important in such factories. The operator of a designated factory shall appoint a certain number of energy managers in charge of activities for rational energy use, formulate a medium-to-long termplan and submit such a plan every year to the competent minister and report the status of energy consumption every year to the competent minister. |
| 4) | Instructions, announcement and order to make
rationalization plans If a 1st class designated energy management factory is judged to be in egregious breach of energy ratio-nalization guidelines, the competent minister may instruct the factory operator to prepare a rationaliza-tion plan, and if the operator does not obey the instructions, they can announce to that effect or give an order for taking any action to respond to the instructions, after hearing the opinion of the council concerned. |
| 5) | 2nd class designated energy management factories As for those factories other than the 1st class designated energy management factories whose consumption of fuels, etc. or electricity is on a medium scale (whose annual consumption of fuels is l,500kL or more in terms of crude oil and whose annual electric consumption is 6 million kWh or more), there is the need for promoting the rational use of energy in the same way as 1st class designated energy man-agement factories. Thus the Law provides that the Minister of International Trade and Industry may designate these factories as 2nd class designated energy management factories. The Law prescribes that those who manage 2nd class designated energy management factories shall appoint energy managers, cause those appointed energy managers to take an energy conservation course, and keep the record of the conditions of energy use, etc. |
| 6) | Recommendation If a 2nd class designated energy management factory is judged to be in egregious of energy rationalization guidelines, the competent minister may recommend necessary measures for the rational use of energy. |
[Classitication of designated management factory]
[Heat Mnager]
[Electricity Manager]
