Circular Economy

Basic Policy

As resource depletion and environmental problems become more serious, we see reducing our corporate activities’ environmental impact and improving sustainability as vital hurdles to surmount. Specifically, we will review the design of our products and production processes to optimize resource use and reduce waste generation. We will also promote the reuse and recycling of waste materials to reuse them as effective resources, thereby reducing the input of new resources and contributing to the realization of a circular economy.

Development of Environmentally Friendly Products

To steadily reduce the environmental impact of our products, we design and develop products in an environmentally friendly manner. In newly developed products, product assessment is conducted at the design stage. For the 37 evaluation criteria that are believed to impact the environment throughout the product’s lifecycle, evaluations are performed by comparing them with benchmark products and alternative solutions, among other factors. The assessments determine whether comprehensive measures must be considered to address the identified criteria. In the future, we will review the assessment items and work to expand the range of products covered, as well as strengthen the development of environmentally friendly products.

Main Solutions Examples of Environmentally Friendly Products
Product development using biomass plastics:
Development of materi-als such as plant-derived resins and replacement with biomass-based materials
TACT Switch™ made of biomass material

TACT Switch™ made of biomass material

Magnetic material development and application technology, circuit technology:
Compact and lightweight power electronics products, including DC-DC converters, with high power conversion efficiency
Liqualloy™

Liqualloy™

Insulating TriMagiC Converter™

Insulating TriMagiC Converter™

Sensing technology, wireless communication technology, packaging technology:
Low cost, lower power consumption, and long-distance transmission package, 10 years of continuous operation without recharging, and seamless indoor/outdoor positioning
MonoTra™

MonoTra™

Reduction of Waste

The Waste & Water Working Group was established under the Sustainability Promotion Committee, recognizing that reducing and recycling waste emissions is essential for realizing a circular economy. In fiscal 2022, we established a global activity structure and confirmed emissions-reduction measures and possible emissions reductions at each production site. As we advance, in addition to promoting the steady implementation of reduction measures, we will work to recycle resources.

Total waste emissions (consolidated) Fiscal 2020 Fiscal 2021 Fiscal 2022
21.9 thousand t
(16.1% reduction)
22.8 thousand t
(4.1% increase)
25.9 thousand t
(13.6% increase)

Water Use Reduction

As we operate our business in various countries, we recognize water issues as an important issue, a common environmental theme worldwide. To this end, we are working to reduce water consumption through the efforts of the Waste & Water Working Group of the Sustainability Promotion Committee. Particularly, drought risk is a concern in some regions, such as China and India, where we are taking water-saving measures, such as using recycled water. In fiscal 2022, we surveyed water use at each site. We raised the annual reduction target to 2% for sites that use water in production activities and set the company-wide reduction target at 1.5%.

Water use (water intake)
(consolidated)
Fiscal 2020 Fiscal 2021 Fiscal 2022
1,743 thousand ㎥
(0.2% increase)
1,814 thousand ㎥
(4.1% increase)
1,674 thousand ㎥
(7.7% reduction)

* The result in fiscal 2022 includes a decrease due to the deconsolidation of Alps Logistics Co., Ltd.