Communitiy Support and Contributions

Support Activities After the Great East Japan Earthquake

Immediate Relief Efforts

The INPEX Group donated ¥200 million to the Japanese Red Cross Society to help communities devastated by the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11, 2011. We also donated additional funds of approximately ¥4.8 million, collected from among members of the Group.

Also, for communities in Fukushima Prefecture with whom we have a long-running relationship—23 years from 1984 to 2007—through natural gas production operations in the Offshore Iwaki Gas Field offshore from Naraha, Fukushima, we delivered emergency relief supplies in the form of daily essentials, including drinking water, rice, diapers, gas cylinders, and gas stoves, directly to emergency shelters using our own trucks.

As the reconstruction effort is expected to drag on, the INPEX Group will continue to provide all possible support, such as sending volunteers to affected areas, in order to facilitate a return to normality for disaster victims.

Supplying Japanese Power Plants with Oil and LNG from Foreign Sources

Oil-fired and natural-gas-fired thermal plants are being used more and more to replace nuclear power plants disabled by the disaster. And we have responded to additional requests in April and May from electric-power companies for increased supplies of oil and LNG from our overseas sources. We will strive in the future also to comply with such requests to the best of our ability.

Delivering Petroleum Products to the Disaster Zone

A tanker truck carrying diesel oil

Responding to urgent requests for fuel from the affected areas in the weeks immediately following the disaster, we supplied approximately 400 kiloliters—or 21 tanker trucks—of petroleum products (gasoline, kerosene, diesel oil, and heavy oil) refined and manufactured at our refineries from crude oil produced in Japan to devastated communities in Fukushima Prefecture.

Using our own trucks and maintaining communication with recipients in the area, we carried gasoline and diesel oil to the filling stations of bus companies that were still operating, to be used for emergency vehicles, water trucks, and other relief vehicles. Kerosene we delivered was used as heating fuel, and heavy oil was used as an emergency fuel for generating power at hospitals in the disaster zone.

We also delivered class-C heavy oil refined from crude oil produced in Japan to electric utilities to be used as fuel for power generation.

Utility Gas Subsidiary Joins the Reconstruction Effort

Responding to a request from a utility gas company in Miyagi Prefecture, where the devastation was among the most severe, Sakata Natural Gas Co., a Group company in the utility gas business in Sakata, Yamagata Prefecture, formed a partnership with two nearby utility gas companies and began operations to support the reconstruction effort in Miyagi. Given that nearly 90% of the houses in the area were washed away or flooded by the tsunami, activities were largely a battle with removing seawater. Still, Sakata Natural Gas worked with other businesses from the end of April to the end of May, and completed the planned reconstruction work without major difficulties.

Mamoru Sato
Deputy Manager
Teiseki Transport System Co., Ltd.

On March 17, within days after the earthquake, I found myself gripping the steering wheel of a 14-ton truck packed with drinking water, blankets, and other relief supplies bound for Soma, Fukushima Prefecture, fixed only on the thought of getting there as fast as safely possible. “Thank you!” “You’re a life saver!” “Let me help!” were among the responses I heard when I arrived at the shelter. With the residents of Soma quickly unloading package after package, we managed in 40 minutes to empty the truck, which took two hours to fill. By coming in direct contact with the gratefulness of people who were affected by the disaster, I felt a sharp sense of the mission we have as distributors and the immense honor of being a professional driver.

Community Support

Forest Management Support Program

The INPEX Group is participating in a forest management project backed by Niigata Prefecture’s “Forest Management Support Program” to help conserve the global environment, deepen relationships with local communities and raise environmental awareness among our employees.

In this program, Niigata Prefecture serves as the agent to borrow unmanaged land from their landowners, and we grow and manage the forests for them. We intend to plant and care for trees for a commitment period of 10 years on a 0.8 hectare parcel of land near the Minami Nagaoka Gas Field.

A combined total of some 160 people including employees, their families, and local residents participated in two project events, one in fall 2010 and the other in spring 2011. At the first event, we planted 300 beech, konara oak, maple, and other trees, and held an ecology class for children. At the second event, we installed braces for young trees bent by snow, and also “took a whack” at hammering plug spawn into logs to grow mushrooms (in this process, wooden plugs containing mushroom spores are pounded into holes in a log). In the upcoming fall 2011 event, we will add walnut trees to the mix, thus enhancing the variety of trees in the forest.

Noriyuki Aoyagi
Coordinator
Planning & Coordination Administration Unit
Domestic Project Division

Forest Management Support Program

A lot of people’s ideas went into planning the “Forest Management Support Program,” including the concept for the program and what name to give the forest.
While I had limited knowledge of what trees are suited to this area and other plant-related information, we were able to launch a successful program thanks to the support and cooperation of Niigata Prefecture and the Chuetsu Yotsuba Forestry Cooperative, everyone at Koshiji Momiji-no-Kai, who donated commemorative maple seedlings, the landowner, and numerous local residents.

Jan. 11, 2011Activity Report on the “Forest Management Support Program”( Fall 2010 - Fall 2011 ) (PDF 95KB)

Supporting and Participating in Community Events

The INPEX Group actively supports and participates in a variety of community events.

Every year in Nagaoka, Niigata Prefecture, one of our main production centers in Japan, we sponsor the fireworks celebration of the Nagaoka Festival. In Kashiwazaki, Niigata Prefecture, we recruit employee volunteers to run or support other runners competing in the Kashiwazaki Shiokaze Marathon and sponsor the fireworks portion of the Gion Kashiwazaki Festival. Over 100 people affiliated with the INPEX Group danced in each of the July 2010 Gion Kashiwazaki folk dance parade and the August 2010 Niigata Festival folk dance parade. We also sponsor fireworks celebrations in Niigata and Joetsu, Niigata Prefecture, and Akita, Akita Prefecture every year.

In Chiba Prefecture, we sponsored the 65th National Sports Festival.

By supporting and participating in community events like these, we aim to promote an understanding of our company and business among local communities and residents—one of our stakeholder groups—and coexist harmoniously with them as a corporate citizen.