Sand Dune Conservation and Management Project

Project Leader

Prof. Dai Nagamatsu, Faculty of Agriculture

Project Organization

Conservation and Wise Use Group

Leader: Prof. Dai Nagamatsu, Faculty of Agriculture

“Provide Our Unique Experience in Sand Dune with Dryland and the world ”

Renewable Energy Utilization Group

Leader: Assoc Prof. Kotaro Tagawa, Faculty of Agriculture

“Development and application for renewable energy utilization system in dunes and drylands”

Project Overview

“Creation of new values from the coastal sand dune, the foundation of arid land research.”

The Sand Dune Conservation and Management Project is aiming to preserve and utilize sand dunes sustainably through the application of knowledge accumulated from the grass roots of IPDRE, the Tottori Sand Dunes. The group also attempts to cultivate and disseminate the information unique to Tottori, San’in. The Tottori Sand Dunes, well-known coastal sand dunes, are very important components of San’in Kaigan Geopark. The outputs of the research on conservation of coastal sand dunes can help the reconstruction process of the coastal areas affected by the Great East Japan Earthquake.

Conservation and Wise Use Group is working on the theme of ecosystem, history and human activities in the sand dune area. In terms of ecosystem, we examine and elucidate the origin of unique geography like Tottori Sand Dunes, the mechanism of maintenance and its outlook, human interventions such as sand land development and its biodiversity, the relationship between the sand lands and its ecosystem services. The ecosystem at the Tottori Sand Dunes are starting to be affected by the increasing number of tourists. However, meanwhile, we had really bright news such as the re-discovery of Ophioglossum thermal (see figure 1; found in June 2015), one of Tottori’s endangered plants, for the first time in 24 years.

Regarding the history and human activities study, we focus on the human-sand dune relationship by working on research, conservation, exhibition, and utilization of sand dune ruins.

By excavating the dune ruins, we examine the development of dunes and transitions of human activities in archaeological perspective (see figure 2). We will keep working on the study of historical dune utilizations through the contrast to other dune ruins in the world. The Renewable Energy Utilization Group is evaluating natural energy resources available in coastal sand dune areas, and developing systems to utilize these energies for water pumping and purification. Development of these systems such as solar panel system, wind-power generation system, and sand prevention system (see figure 3) would be very useful for agricultural activities in sand dunes and deserts.