Ken Noguchi

is a Japanese mountaineer and environmental activist. His father was a diplomat, so he lived in the U.S., Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Japan. He was often bullied because he was half-Japanese. In 1999, at the age of 25, he became the youngest person (at that time) to scale the Seven Summits, the highest mountains on each of the seven continents. He graduated from Asia University in 2000, and studied environmental education at Aomori University. Since then, he has worked on various mountain clean-up projects around the world, including projects at Mount Everest, His work has had a notable effect on efforts in Japan, where he has given many lectures to promote better environmental practices.

He attended Rikkyo School in England an independent boarding school affiliated with Rikkyo University in Japan. At the age of 15, he was suspended from school for one month due to a conflict with another student and was sent home to his parents in Japan. At his father's advice, he took this time to travel alone. While traveling, he read a book by world-renowned Japanese adventurer Naomi Uemura. Noguchi was inspired by Uemura to try mountain climbing, Seven Summits timeline In honor of his accomplishment, Noguchi was selected for the Tokyo Citizens' Honorary Award for Culture in 1999. After completing the climb, he organized a group of climbers to begin removing litter. The team succeeded in removing approximately 8 tons of garbage, including over 400 discarded oxygen containers. and it was reported that 1.6 tons of litter was removed, including 84 empty oxygen containers.

Hoping to bring the effort to his homeland of Japan, he gave televised interviews to showcase the problems of Everest. He has expressed his feeling that governments should place a greater focus on environmental education, integrating it into standard curricula. His goal was to inspire others to clean up Mount Fuji, which collects a large amount of trash as a major tourist attraction. He repeatedly referred to the state of the mountain as a "disgrace" of a national symbol. He talked about his ongoing environmental work in his second book, , published by Shueisha International in 2002.

In 2005, a project began with the goal of cleaning Manaslu, a mountain that has a long history of Japanese ascents. The project attracted the attention of former Japanese prime minister Ryutaro Hashimoto. He expressed his gratitude to Noguchi for working on Mount Fuji and his hope for a more environmentally conscious future.