Environmental Management


Environmental Charter

The Kawasaki Group has instituted an Environmental Charter, to promote environmental management activities. This contains its Environmental Philosophy and Conduct Guidelines, which indicate the common values, principles of environmental management activities, and daily codes of conduct required of all individuals at the Group.

Environmental Philosophy

The Kawasaki Group pursues business activities globally in key industries related to land, sea, and air, guided by the desire to contribute to the development of society through monozukuri manufacturing. In this effort, as a group, we emphasize the "realization of a carbon-free society," "realization of a recycling-oriented society," and "realization of a society coexisting with nature" to help solve global environmental issues, and we strive to help build a sustainable society through environmentally harmonious business activities and environmentally conscious Kawasaki-brand products and services.

Conduct Guidelines

Global environmental problems are serious issues shared by people around the world and, making it a management priority to ensure that business activities are conducted in harmony with the environment, we will strive willingly and vigorously toward this goal.

  1. We will endeavor to conserve resources, save energy, recycle, and reduce industrial waste in production stages, and we will promote efforts to limit the impact of our operations on the environment.
  2. We will carefully consider environmental impact during product planning, R&D and design stages to limit as much as possible any environmental impact caused during procurement, production, distribution, utilization and disposal stages of the products we make and market.
  3. We will strive to minimize the impact our business activities have on ecosystems and engage proactively in efforts to protect these ecosystems.
  4. In seeking solutions to global environmental issues, we will develop and provide new technologies and new products that effectively contribute to environmental protection and reduced consumption of energy and natural resources.
  5. Going beyond environment-related laws, regulations, conventions, and self-established action plans in related industries, we will implement our own environmental control standards, as appropriate, and strive to improve environmental management.
  6. Through environmental training and public relations activities, we will strive to elicit greater awareness of global environmental issues among all employees and will encourage employees to perform a self-improvement review and participate in social contribution activities.
  7. We will implement an environmental management system for environmental protection activities, hold regular conferences on environmental protection activities, undertake reviews, and strive to achieve continual improvement in our environmental protection activities.

Kawasaki Global Environmental Vision 2050

Pursuing Three "Frees": CO2 FREE, Waste FREE and Harm FREE

In light of the Paris Agreement enacted to restrict global warming and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by the United Nations, the Kawasaki Group has announced that it will collaborate toward the realization of a sustainable society in the future, and formulated the "Kawasaki Global Environmental Vision 2050."
 The Group will take on its three major objectives to embody its aspirations for 2050 of "CO2 FREE," "Waste FREE," and "Harm FREE," and will actively contribute to mitigating global warming, promoting a recycling-oriented society, and protecting biodiversity.

Environmental Vision 2050

The Environmental Management Activities Plan 2023 (FY2023–2025)

Based on the Environmental Philosophy and Conduct Guidelines given in the Environmental Charter, as well as the Group Mission and the Group Vision 2030, the Group has formulated the Environmental Management Activities Plan as key strategies which cater to the needs of society (ESG investment, information disclosure) and facilitate the realization of both environmental conservation and business growth and the Kawasaki Global Environmental Vision 2050 goals of "CO2 FREE," "Waste FREE," and "Harm FREE."
 Until 2021, the activities plan was formulated every three years, with follow-up on progress conducted annually. However, in view of the ever-changing requirements relating to the environment, including the move toward decarbonization, resource recycling, and biodiversity, the plan has been formulated as one which looks ahead three years from 2022 and which will be reviewed annually.
 For CO2 FREE (realization of a decarbonized society), the Group embodies its carbon neutrality strategies in the Environmental Plan, and is actively moving toward achieving carbon neutrality at domestic business sites by 2030.
 For Waste FREE (realization of a recycling-oriented society), we will continue to actively investigate circular economy business models to cater to the circular economy.
 For Harm FREE (realization of a society coexisting with nature), we will continue to actively disclose the outcomes of macro-impact studies of effects on biodiversity from the Group’s operations and measures to address these as a means to meeting the requirements of the TNFD (Task Force on Nature-Related Financial Disclosures).
 Refer to individual pages for details of the key strategies for CO2 FREE, Waste FREE and Harm FREE.


Environmental Management Promotion Structure

At the Kawasaki Group, the Board of Directors is positioned as the supreme decision-making body responsible for deliberations on and finalization of fundamental sustainability policies and basic plans for the entire Group.
 In addition, the Group have established the Sustainability Committee, as an executive-level committee chaired by the President, which decides on various measures based on the basic plan stipulated by the Board of Directors and delivers progress reports to the Board of Directors.
 Environmental management strategies, including risks and opportunities related to climate change, are deliberated on by the Sustainability Committee as part of fundamental sustainability polices for the entire Group, and the Sustainability Committee delivers regular reports on activities related to environmental management to the Board of Directors.
 We also set out basic matters relating to environmental and energy management, and have instituted an environmental management system and energy management system with the aim of extending the Environmental Management Activities Plan to the business segments and of promoting the effective use of energy.

Environmental Management Promotion Structure

Responsible Officer

Hiroshi Nakatani, Representative Director, Senior Corporate Executive Officer, Chief Environmental Officer


Compliance with Environmental Laws and Regulations

Response to Environmental Laws and Regulations

We hold liaison conferences as needed for personnel with environmental responsibilities to ensure adherence to environmental laws and regulations, the dissemination and full understanding of legal revisions, and the enhancement of their capabilities. These conferences, which are held under the direction of the Head Office Environmental Management Division, serve as opportunities for working with Group personnel to preempt environmental accidents and other compliance-related problems.
 In recent years, we have implemented initiatives in response to laws and regulations related to chemical substances, such as the European Union's ELV Directive*1, RoHS Directive*2, and REACH Regulation*3, as well as the Euro 4 regulation on motorcycle exhaust emissions.
 In fiscal 2022, there were no revisions to relevant laws. We will continue to collect information on applicable laws and regulations going forward.

*1 ELV Directive: End of Life Vehicles Directive

*2 RoHS Directive: Directive on Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Equipment

*3 REACH Regulation: Regulation on Registration, Evaluation, Authorization and Restriction of Chemicals


Environmental Compliance

The Kawasaki Group strives to implement environmental management activities in compliance with environmental laws and regulations.
 There were no incidents resulting in fines in fiscal 2022.

The number of accidents and pollution incidents which have resulted in environmental problems as well as the number of complaints regarding environmental issues have been summarized on the ESG data page. All of these have been successfully resolved through the institution of actions and measures to prevent recurrence.


Environmental Education

Various Training Conducted

We conduct a variety of training for Group employees to increase their understanding of environmental management.

Target Content
(format)
Frequency Fiscal 2022 results
Managerial staff Mainly environmental management (e-learning) Content will be updated with the formulation of each three-year Environmental Management Activities Plan and education carried out within the period of the plan Implementation:
February 15–March 31, 2023

Participants:
Approx. 4,500 (approx. 95%) (for all target employees)
General employees Practical implementation of environmental management (distribution of pamphlets) Content will be updated with the formulation of each three-year Environmental Management Activities Plan and distributed to all general employees upon such update and to new hires thereafter Implementation:
April 2022–March 2023

Recipients:
Approx. 350

Raising Environmental Awareness

We periodically distribute information internally to raise environmental awareness. We conduct ongoing awareness raising activities, including the publication of environment related articles in the Kawasaki Group internal bulletin, distribution of the President’s message for Environment Month, and distribution of information (case examples of energy saving, forestation activity reports, environmental activities at respective business sites, etc.) through our intranet, so that employees can put environmentally conscious activities into practice not only at the workplace, but also in their local communities and homes.
 The Kawasaki Group internal bulletin published in February 2023 included an article on the Kawasaki Group's climate change initiatives. Questionnaire results indicated the high level of interest in this topic, with the article being selected as the best in the issue.

Cultivating Qualified Managers

To enrich management activities emphasizing energy and the environment, we are striving to cultivate individuals with legal qualifications required under laws and regulations related to energy and the environment. The number of employees with legal qualifications at the Kawasaki Group in the most recent four years is indicated in the ESG data.
 We also conduct training for internal ISO 14001 environmental management and environmental auditors as an internal qualification. As of the end of fiscal 2022, there were 1,530 individual environmental management and environmental auditors.


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