KYOTO -- For most people, tearing down a perfectly good house to build a new one may not seem all that environmentally friendly.

But for Nagoya University professor Satoru Ikeuchi, the completion in 1998 of his new home in Kyoto's Nishigyo Ward allowed him to make something tangible from the ideas he has had for years.

As a scientist, the 57-year-old astrophysicist knew only too well the dangers posed by carbon dioxide emissions and nuclear waste. But as a citizen, he had done nothing to address these problems.

Mismanagement and a series of accidents at nuclear power plants by the now-defunct Power Reactor and Nuclear Fuel Development Corp. in the mid-1990s prompted him to act.

He came to the conclusion that Japan's nuclear energy policy will not be able to guarantee a steady power supply and that "nuclear energy effectively passes the burden (of waste disposal) on to future generations, 10,000 years ahead."

So Ikeuchi decided to set up a solar power generator on the roof of his house, but this would require the construction of a new home since the building was so old it probably would have required renovation in 10 years.

"Only with the solar power generator on the roof did I actually start tackling energy issues in real life. That was how I changed my lifestyle," he said.

The 24 sq. meters of solar panels on his new home now generate up to 3.2 kw of electricity. He sells the surplus to Kansai Electric Power Co. and purchases power from the utility when the panels do not generate sufficient electricity.

Ikeuchi explains that meters showing how much electricity the device is generating and how much he is buying from and selling to Kepco allow him to save more power than he did before.

Well aware that the demolition of his house would produce a huge amount of waste, Ikeuchi said he tried to build the new one with as much natural material as possible so that when it is eventually destroyed, most of the waste will either biodegrade or be recycled, without releasing a large amount of harmful chemicals.

The cost was 1.5 times more than with conventional, modern construction, but in the long term, the professor maintained, it is more economical.

"Japanese homes that are not built to a buyer's specifications last only 26 years on average. Building a house is a once-in-a-lifetime experience and I wanted a house that would last 100 years and leave no nonbiodegradable material for my children and grandchildren, even if it cost more."

As a result of his desire to have an environmentally friendly house, the home was built using local wood and traditional Japanese construction techniques rather than modern "ecological" technology, of which Ikeuchi is skeptical.

The recent popularity of goods and services dubbed "environmentally friendly" makes him suspicious, he says, because he believes that items are worthy of such praise only after taking into account the total amount of energy used to produce them and dispose of them.

Ikeuchi believes that sooner or later, humans will be forced to change their lifestyles to curb energy consumption, due to what he calls "environmental pressure."

"Mass consumption of energy" he theorized, "will eventually change the environment in a way that will make our lives more difficult."

Education -- particularly of the young -- is the key to changing people's consciousness and avoiding catastrophe, emphasizes Ikeuchi.

"If pupils see a solar power generator at school and how much power it is generating, they will definitely try to use less power," he said.

"And we need to have a longer and more diverse perspective on things -- so that we realize that efficiency, notably economic efficiency, will not be our only value -- cutting ourselves free from mass production, mass consumption and mass dumping."