Under the “decarbonised power utilisation” category, eight areas covering ten sites were selected, including Kashiwazaki City in Niigata Prefecture, as well as sites in Aomori, Fukui and Shimane prefectures. The initiative seeks to develop industrial parks powered by decarbonised electricity sources, including nuclear power and renewable energy, and establish new models for attracting industry to power-generating regions.
In Kashiwazaki, plans call for the Kujiranami Industrial Park to receive a stable supply of 100% decarbonised electricity generated from nuclear power and renewable energy. The city is also considering the local use of a portion of the electricity generated by nuclear power that has traditionally been transmitted to the Tokyo metropolitan area.
Other sites selected under the decarbonised power utilisation category include Rokkasho Village and Rokunohe Town in Aomori Prefecture, Fukui City and Obama City in Fukui Prefecture, and Matsue City in Shimane Prefecture.
The GX Strategic Areas initiative was established in August 2025 to implement the industrial location policies set out in the government’s GX 2040 Vision, which was approved by the Cabinet in February 2025. The government plans to provide support to selected areas while pursuing related regulatory and institutional reforms.
METI also selected nine areas covering ten sites under a separate category aimed at developing clusters of data centres. These include Satsumasendai City in Kagoshima Prefecture, which had previously been identified in April as a promising area for the use of decarbonised power. Details of the plans for the data centre areas will be released at a later date.
The government had announced at a meeting of its GX Implementation Council on 26 August that the first GX Strategic Areas would soon be selected from among the promising areas identified in April. Other candidate areas will be designated in stages as their project plans become sufficiently developed.
