About 70% of public elementary and junior high school gymnasiums and martial arts halls in Japan lack air conditioning equipment [1].
This shortage poses a significant risk to public safety during natural disasters. Because these facilities are designated as emergency shelters, the lack of cooling systems increases the risk of heatstroke for evacuees during summer months.
A survey conducted in May 2026 revealed a national average installation rate of 33.1% [1]. Other reports suggest the national average may be as low as 23.7% [2]. The disparity highlights a systemic gap in disaster preparedness across different regions of the country.
In Kumamoto Prefecture, the situation is particularly acute. Only 20.9% of the 532 designated evacuation shelters in the prefecture have cooling equipment, totaling 111 buildings [1]. This leaves the vast majority of the region's primary emergency sites without a means to regulate temperature during extreme heat events.
Other regions show even steeper declines in availability. In Saga Prefecture, only one out of 205 public elementary and junior high school gymnasiums is equipped with air conditioning [3, 4]. This represents an installation rate of approximately 0.5% [3].
The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology said to use facilities that possess cooling equipment to mitigate health risks [1]. Despite these recommendations, the physical infrastructure of the nation's school-based shelter system remains largely unequipped for high-temperature emergencies.
“About 70% of public elementary and junior high school gymnasiums and martial arts halls in Japan lack air conditioning equipment”
The gap between government safety recommendations and actual infrastructure indicates a critical failure in adapting disaster management to climate change. While the Ministry of Education advocates for cooled shelters, the actual installation rates, particularly the near-total absence of cooling in Saga and low rates in Kumamoto, suggest that local governments are struggling to fund or prioritize the retrofitting of these essential public spaces.
