The German-Japanese Symposium took place from 27 to 29 November under the auspices of Bremerhaven University of Applied Sciences.

The event was primarily aimed at knowledge transfer in the field of renewable energy production and utilisation. Focussing on offshore wind energy and hydrogen technologies, the symposium participants used their time in Bremerhaven for an intensive scientific exchange with a strong practical focus.
At the invitation of Prof Dr Dr h.c. Gerhard Feldmeier, scientists and business development representatives from the Japanese prefecture of Fukuoka travelled to Bremerhaven. Some time ago, Bremerhaven was chosen as a German model city for the green economy and the symposium was used to intensify existing contacts at a local political and scientific level. 

In Japan, which has so far been characterised by a static, conservative energy policy, there has been a growing realisation in recent years that the country urgently needs an energy policy transformation and must introduce appropriate measures to achieve this. Against this backdrop, regions have been identified in Japan in recent years which, on the one hand, are among the largest industrial fossil fuel energy consumers and, on the other hand, are geo-strategically particularly suitable for making a significant contribution to the energy transition, including Fukuoka Prefecture with its heavy industry and harbour city of Kitakyushu on the southern island of Kyushu.

The local government there was tasked by the state government with looking abroad for guidance and identifying regions with similar economic conditions and geographical locations in order to learn from their experiences in coping with structural change and to derive their own energy policy solutions from best practice examples. To this end, Germany was chosen as a model country for the energy transition and the Bremerhaven region in particular was identified as a model region for climate protection, the green economy and the expansion of renewable energies.  

Not least for this reason, the Japanese side expressed a desire to promote scientific dialogue in this area, which led to the organisation of this three-day symposium in Bremerhaven. The main purpose of this event, which was attended by around 60 participants, was to familiarise the guests from Japan with the latest scientific findings in this specialist field and to present them with practical implementation results that are recommended for imitation. As a direct cooperation project, elements from the local Offshore Wind Energy Master's degree programme (OWEMBA) were adopted for the further academic training of specialists and managers from the wind industry at the local partner university, the University of Kitakyushu. 

 In addition, the exchange with the Japanese participants provided insights into the latest scientific methods and practical implementation results of renewable energy generation for the realisation of the energy policy transformation in Japan. 
In addition to professors from the university with relevant scientific and technical expertise, in particular from its Institutes of Wind Energy (fk-wind), Economics and Management (IME), Institute for Safety and Security Studies (ISaSS), Smart Mobility Institute (SMI), from the H2-Microgrid research project, the BIS Bremerhavener Gesellschaft für Investitionsförderung und Stadtentwicklung mbH, the Fraunhofer Institute for Wind Energy and Energy System Technology (IWES), the Wind Energy Agency Bremerhaven (WAB) and representatives from business, administration and other international partner universities were also present: representatives from business, administration and other international partner universities from Esbjerg (DK) and Gdynia (PL). 

The organisation and implementation of the symposium was generously supported financially by the Freundeskreis zur Förderung der Wissenschaft Bremerhaven and with sponsorship from the regional economy.