Event Overview

The Kitakyushu International Conference Center, where the GOWS-J conference will be held, opened in October 1990. In addition to international conferences, it hosts a variety of gatherings, including academic conferences and seminars.

The Conference Center has a main hall with simultaneous interpretation equipment (capacity: 585 people), an international conference room (theater style, 200 seats), an event hall, and six small and medium conference rooms. The exhibition will be held in the West Japan General Exhibition Center Annex, which opened in April 1998 following the main building in 1977 and at the same time as the AIM (Asia Pacific Import Mart) Building. The exhibition area is spacious, with a floor area of 8,000 square meters and an effective ceiling height of 13 meters. GOWS-J will use two-thirds of the space.

We are also preparing to make the conference rooms on the third floor of the AIM Building (conference rooms 311–315, 501 square meters) available for networking and mini sessions by exhibitors.

Since 2011, Kitakyushu City has been engaged in the Green Energy Port Hibiki Project to create a comprehensive hub for the wind power generation industry.

In 2016, as a part of this project, a public auction was held to attract an offshore wind farm to Kitakyushu port. The long-awaited construction will begin this spring. Port facility maintenance to support this kind of construction is underway and, in 2020, Kitakyushu port was designated by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism as a base port and harbor for offshore renewable energy power generation facilities. In terms of industrial development, the city is working to improve the port’s ability to handle large parts and O&M functions, while striving to attract more companies to the city. Now the port is moving forward with an eye to next-generation challenges including floating wind turbines, increasing turbine sizes, and turbine recycling.

Kitakyushu City was formed in 1963 through the merger of the five cities of Moji, Kokura, Tobata, Yahata, and Wakamatsu. The Imperial Steel Works opened in Yahata in 1901 and contributed greatly to the industrial modernization of Japan. At the time, Japanese industry lagged far behind that of Europe and the United States, but the arrival of Commodore Perry had already ushered in the beginning of Japan’s industrial revolution. Japan gained technical knowledge from Europe and the United States, continued innovating in a uniquely Japanese way, and became a world-class industrial nation. At the same time, rapid growth created serious environmental pollution problems, such as air pollution and contamination due to industrial waste and domestic wastewater. Citizens, government, and companies then came together to improve the environment. They worked for years to remedy these environmental problems. In April 2018, Kitakyushu City was selected by the OECD as a global model city for promoting the SDGs, the first such city in Asia. Today Kitakyushu continues to work toward building a sustainable society.

GOWS-J Host City (Kitakyushu City) Kitakyushu City is in northern Fukuoka prefecture, on the northernmost tip of Kyushu, across the Kanmon Straits from Honshu. It is a place where urban and natural environments coexist. Because it is surrounded by ocean and mountains, Kitakyushu boasts an abundance of delicacies from both the land and sea. Kitakyushu City is home to a variety of historical landmarks. In particular, the First Head Office of the Imperial Steel Works has been added to the World Heritage list because of its part in Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution, which contributed to the modernization of Japan. In March 2022, Kitakyushu was chosen as the city with the most spectacular night views in Japan. Some of the most magical views include the quintessential nightscape viewpoint on Mount Sarakura, the view of the red illumination of Wakato Bridge as seen from Takatoyama park, and the factory lights as viewed from pleasure boats on the water.