Jointly Awarded 'Excellence Award' with Gamagori City at Japan Resilience Award 2026
Inek Co., Ltd. and Gamagori City won the Excellence Award at the Japan Resilience Award 2026 for their joint PPP project establishing off-grid shelters that achieve both resilience and decarbonization.
📋 Article Processing Timeline
- 📰 Published: April 25, 2026 at 03:47
- 🔍 Collected: April 24, 2026 at 19:32
- 🤖 AI Analyzed: April 24, 2026 at 21:24 (1h 52m after Collected)
Scenes from the award ceremony
Inek Co., Ltd., in recognition of its "simultaneous realization of resilience enhancement and decarbonization through mutual public-private cooperation" undertaken jointly with Gamagori City, Aichi Prefecture, has been jointly awarded the Excellence Award in the Corporate and Industry Category along with Gamagori City at the "12th Japan Resilience Award 2026" hosted by the Association for Resilience Japan. A certificate of commendation was presented at the award ceremony held on April 21, 2026.
Overview of the Award
With natural disasters becoming more severe and frequent, such as the Great East Japan Earthquake and the Noto Peninsula Earthquake, learning from past disaster experiences, it is essential to improve the living environment of evacuation shelters, such as securing electricity and air conditioning during a disaster. However, such improvements have not progressed sufficiently nationwide.
In collaboration with Gamagori City, our company has held multiple discussions with the city's disaster prevention, architecture, environment, and education departments to debate the "ideal evacuation shelter." We concluded that it is necessary to develop off-grid (independent) shelters that can secure lifelines such as electricity and air conditioning even during local power outages, and have promoted this plan.
Details of the Initiative
Over two years, we formulated a plan to improve 17 large shelter facilities in the city, completing the improvement of a total of 7 facilities, including 6 junior high schools and the gymnasium of Gamagori Culture Square, by March 2025. The remaining 10 elementary schools were also completed during fiscal year 2025. The main improvements are as follows:
● Electricity: Automatically switches power supply to specific equipment used in the shelter during a disaster. Supplies power generated during the day while charging batteries, and utilizes battery power at night. By deploying V2X, power supply via EV cars and power transfer between facilities are possible, ensuring continuous power.
● Air Conditioning: Introduced independent GHP air conditioning equipment that can operate even during power outages. Built a system to ensure a comfortable evacuation life during disasters.
● Lighting: Introduced dimmable LEDs in the arena, paying consideration to maintaining the rhythm of life in the shelter.
Results and Features
This initiative is characterized by simultaneously solving multiple social issues starting from disaster prevention measures.
● Disaster Prevention (Resilience Enhancement): Realized an evacuation environment that can secure electricity and air conditioning even during power outages.
● Environment (Decarbonization): Contributed to achieving the region's decarbonization goals through the introduction of solar power generation and storage batteries.
● Education (Improvement of School Environment): Contributed to the improvement of the learning environment during normal times through the installation of air conditioning equipment.
Furthermore, using private funds and subsidies, the equipment was introduced on a lease basis. By allocating the amount of electricity bill reduction to lease payments, the actual financial burden is mitigated. By making it a contract that includes maintenance and management, it has become a sustainable model utilizing private sector know-how. This design, based on regional characteristics, has the potential to be deployed to municipalities nationwide, and similar initiatives are currently progressing in neighboring municipalities.
Scenes from the Award Ceremony
At the award ceremony held on April 21, Michiaki Hirose, Chairman of the Association for Resilience Japan (Advisor, Tokyo Gas Co., Ltd.), gave the opening address, introducing that the award has become grander with each iteration, and explaining the background of the newly created Prime Minister's Award and Minister of State for Disaster Management Award since the year before last, which are now awarded together within this award.
Chairman Hirose also stated the following:
"The purpose of national resilience is to protect the lives, property, and health of the people from natural disasters and pandemics. To that end, it is necessary to routinely strive to improve infrastructure and enhance medical systems, as well as to take prompt and thorough measures to minimize damage and impact as much as possible in the unlikely event of a disaster."
In undertaking resilience initiatives, it is essential for the central government and local municipalities to work closely together, concentrate private sector know-how there, and engage in comprehensive efforts integrated between the public and private sectors. In particular, the power of the private sector will become extremely important in the future, and those who will play the core role are the companies, universities, NPOs, and others who continue to make steady efforts in each region.
On the day of the ceremony, certificates were awarded in the presence of Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Ozaki, Minister of State for Disaster Management Makino, First Minister of State for Disaster Management Furuya, State Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Nemoto, and the Special Advisor to the Prime Minister.
This model is already being adopted by other municipalities as a viable solution to fundamental issues potentially faced by local governments nationwide. We plan to continue introducing similar systems to other BCP facilities and will continue to work towards the simultaneous realization of resilience enhancement and decarbonization through public-private partnerships.
About the Japan Resilience Award
The Japan Resilience Award is an award that honors advanced activities, technological developments, product developments, etc., that contribute to building a resilient nation, resilient regions, resilient people, and resilient industries toward the construction of a resilient society for the next generation.
Inek Co., Ltd., in recognition of its "simultaneous realization of resilience enhancement and decarbonization through mutual public-private cooperation" undertaken jointly with Gamagori City, Aichi Prefecture, has been jointly awarded the Excellence Award in the Corporate and Industry Category along with Gamagori City at the "12th Japan Resilience Award 2026" hosted by the Association for Resilience Japan. A certificate of commendation was presented at the award ceremony held on April 21, 2026.
Overview of the Award
With natural disasters becoming more severe and frequent, such as the Great East Japan Earthquake and the Noto Peninsula Earthquake, learning from past disaster experiences, it is essential to improve the living environment of evacuation shelters, such as securing electricity and air conditioning during a disaster. However, such improvements have not progressed sufficiently nationwide.
In collaboration with Gamagori City, our company has held multiple discussions with the city's disaster prevention, architecture, environment, and education departments to debate the "ideal evacuation shelter." We concluded that it is necessary to develop off-grid (independent) shelters that can secure lifelines such as electricity and air conditioning even during local power outages, and have promoted this plan.
Details of the Initiative
Over two years, we formulated a plan to improve 17 large shelter facilities in the city, completing the improvement of a total of 7 facilities, including 6 junior high schools and the gymnasium of Gamagori Culture Square, by March 2025. The remaining 10 elementary schools were also completed during fiscal year 2025. The main improvements are as follows:
● Electricity: Automatically switches power supply to specific equipment used in the shelter during a disaster. Supplies power generated during the day while charging batteries, and utilizes battery power at night. By deploying V2X, power supply via EV cars and power transfer between facilities are possible, ensuring continuous power.
● Air Conditioning: Introduced independent GHP air conditioning equipment that can operate even during power outages. Built a system to ensure a comfortable evacuation life during disasters.
● Lighting: Introduced dimmable LEDs in the arena, paying consideration to maintaining the rhythm of life in the shelter.
Results and Features
This initiative is characterized by simultaneously solving multiple social issues starting from disaster prevention measures.
● Disaster Prevention (Resilience Enhancement): Realized an evacuation environment that can secure electricity and air conditioning even during power outages.
● Environment (Decarbonization): Contributed to achieving the region's decarbonization goals through the introduction of solar power generation and storage batteries.
● Education (Improvement of School Environment): Contributed to the improvement of the learning environment during normal times through the installation of air conditioning equipment.
Furthermore, using private funds and subsidies, the equipment was introduced on a lease basis. By allocating the amount of electricity bill reduction to lease payments, the actual financial burden is mitigated. By making it a contract that includes maintenance and management, it has become a sustainable model utilizing private sector know-how. This design, based on regional characteristics, has the potential to be deployed to municipalities nationwide, and similar initiatives are currently progressing in neighboring municipalities.
Scenes from the Award Ceremony
At the award ceremony held on April 21, Michiaki Hirose, Chairman of the Association for Resilience Japan (Advisor, Tokyo Gas Co., Ltd.), gave the opening address, introducing that the award has become grander with each iteration, and explaining the background of the newly created Prime Minister's Award and Minister of State for Disaster Management Award since the year before last, which are now awarded together within this award.
Chairman Hirose also stated the following:
"The purpose of national resilience is to protect the lives, property, and health of the people from natural disasters and pandemics. To that end, it is necessary to routinely strive to improve infrastructure and enhance medical systems, as well as to take prompt and thorough measures to minimize damage and impact as much as possible in the unlikely event of a disaster."
In undertaking resilience initiatives, it is essential for the central government and local municipalities to work closely together, concentrate private sector know-how there, and engage in comprehensive efforts integrated between the public and private sectors. In particular, the power of the private sector will become extremely important in the future, and those who will play the core role are the companies, universities, NPOs, and others who continue to make steady efforts in each region.
On the day of the ceremony, certificates were awarded in the presence of Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Ozaki, Minister of State for Disaster Management Makino, First Minister of State for Disaster Management Furuya, State Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Nemoto, and the Special Advisor to the Prime Minister.
This model is already being adopted by other municipalities as a viable solution to fundamental issues potentially faced by local governments nationwide. We plan to continue introducing similar systems to other BCP facilities and will continue to work towards the simultaneous realization of resilience enhancement and decarbonization through public-private partnerships.
About the Japan Resilience Award
The Japan Resilience Award is an award that honors advanced activities, technological developments, product developments, etc., that contribute to building a resilient nation, resilient regions, resilient people, and resilient industries toward the construction of a resilient society for the next generation.