Hitachi recognizes that in order to slow the destructive climate change, resource depletion and widespread environmental damage caused by society’s ever increasing need for energy, companies need to reduce their CO2 emissions as well as their production of harmful wastes. That is why Hitachi is committed to developing sustainable, environmentally friendly systems, devices and materials that will allow society to continue to live comfortably while reducing environmental damage and climate change.
Management of the environment is a key focus of the Hitachi Group 2012 Mid-Term Management Plan looking ahead to fiscal 2012. Based on this management policy, Hitachi created the Hitachi Environmental Vision, a plan aimed at preventing global warming, conserving resources and preserving ecosystems to foster a more sustainable society.
As a milestone on the road to realizing this Environmental Vision, Hitachi developed the long-term Environmental Vision 2025, a plan with the bold goal of reducing annual CO2 emissions by 100 million tons by 2025 through Hitachi products and services. Seventy percent of that figure, or 70 million of those 100 million tons, would come from cutting emissions in the power sector, by building sustainable nuclear power plants, improving the efficiency of coal-fired power generation and promoting renewable energy. Another 20 percent, or 20 million tons, would come from developing high-efficiency inverters and transformers and more power efficient data centers. And an additional 10 percent reduction of emissions, or 10 million tons, would come from developing lithium-ion batteries for cars and industry and creating more energy efficient home appliances.
As a result of its Environmental Vision, in 2009 and 2010, Hitachi’s contribution to CO2 emission reduction was over 27 million tons.
For over five years, Hitachi has been working to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the areas of manufacturing, transport and product use. The company has also been applying its technology and expertise to the creation of energy-saving devices and services.
From fiscal 2006 to 2010, Hitachi invested 29.7 billion yen as part of an energy saving initiative across all Japanese operations. As a result, the company was able to reduce CO2 emissions by 290,000 tons from fiscal 1990 levels. Today, Hitachi continues to introduce energy-saving equipment in its different operational groups, switching to natural gas in areas such as materials processing where traditionally heavy oil was used. This and other measures have reduced heavy oil use to around half the fiscal 2005 level.
Outside Japan, Hitachi cut CO2 emissions per unit of production by 7 percent compared with fiscal 2003. And the company has a current goal of reducing CO2 emissions per unit of production across all Group production facilities by 6 percent from fiscal 2005 by fiscal 2011 and by 10 percent by fiscal 2015. For production facilities in Japan, the target is a 16 percent reduction in CO2 emissions from fiscal 1990 by fiscal 2011, and a 20 percent reduction by fiscal 2015.
To address the global problem of resource depletion and environmental pollution, Hitachi implemented a global program to reduce waste, lower natural resource consumption and recycle wherever possible. As part of this initiative, Hitachi is consuming fewer resources during product manufacturing and converting waste into raw materials and energy, reusing end-of-life products and safely extracting rare metals so they can be reused. Furthermore, Hitachi has been reducing the amount of both valuable and non-valuable waste by improving production and manufacturing processes, recycling raw materials and using less packaging. As a result of these efforts, the total-waste reduction group achieved a 33 percent cut by fiscal 2010. With the waste-per-unit production reduction group achieving a 25 percent reduction, both groups met the year’s targets.
Hitachi’s next target is to improve waste generation per unit of production from fiscal 2005 by 16 percent in fiscal 2011 and by 20 percent by fiscal 2015. Moreover, facilities manufacturing high-functional materials are expected to achieve a 7 percent improvement by fiscal 2011 and a 15 percent improvement by fiscal 2015.
Hitachi has been contributing to environmental preservation and biological diversity in a number of ways, including promoting design and production that reduce the impact on ecosystems during the product life cycle The company has also cut emissions of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that cause air pollution, replacing them with less hazardous alternatives and installing equipment to recover and neutralize VOCs. As a result, in fiscal 2010, Hitachi reduced its VOC emissions in Japan to 69 percent of 2000 levels. And at operations located outside of Japan, Hitachi cut VOC emissions by 29 percent from 2005 levels, in both cases achieving its targets. Going forward, Hitachi plans to reduce that rate further, to 5.8 percent in fiscal 2011 and to less than 5 percent in fiscal 2015.
Another integral part of Hitachi’s efforts to reduce the burden on the environment across the product life cycle has been the development of eco-friendly products that meet Hitachi’s rigorous environmental standards. In 1999, Hitachi introduced a Design for Environment (DfE) assessment system that set specific environmentally conscious criteria for the design and development of products and services – at all stages, from material procurement to production through distribution, use and disposal. Those products that meet Hitachi’s DfE requirements are designated as Eco- Products. More recently, Hitachi went one step further, developing a line of Super Eco- Products, products that are at least 10 times more efficient than reference products or else leaders in their industry according to energy efficiency standards.
Hitachi’s goal: to make all group products Eco-Products by 2025. To that end, in fiscal 2010, the number of models designated as Eco-Products rose 1,069, to 9,456. This brought the Eco-Product sales ratio to 60 percent, surpassing Hitachi’s goal of 55 percent. As for Super Eco-Products, an additional 182 models were designated, bringing the total to 721.Going forward, Hitachi plans to introduce a new designation, Eco-Products Select, for products aimed at global warming prevention, and have at least 20 models that meet the Hitachi Eco-Products Select designation by fiscal year 2011 and 100 models by fiscal year 2015.
