Tosoh is aware of the impact on the environment of its operations. It is dedicated to reducing its environmental loading by applying technological and common sense solutions and by exercising care in its use of natural resources and in its handling and management of the products and by-products of its manufacturing operations. The company expends extensive effort and funds on R&D and on employee education programs to ensure the fulfillment of its mission. Its aim is to be a chemical manufacturer devoted to providing value to society and to support society’s and its own sustainable growth.
Input and Output
In manufacturing its products, Tosoh reacts, breaks down, and distills a variety of raw materials. Reacting and breaking down these materials requires heat. That heat is provided by the steam generated by our power-generation boilers, which also produce the electricity needed to drive these processes. We suppress the heat created by the reaction process using industrial-use water and seawater. And we carefully monitor, manage, and work to reduce the atmospheric, land, and water emissions resulting from our manufacturing activities to ease the burden on the environment to the maximum extent possible.
Effective Resource Utilization
The company is constantly working to discover new and innovative ways to reuse and recycle precious natural resources and the by-products of manufacturing. Most industrial waste from Tosoh’s power generation facilities is recycled. Coal ash, for instance, is a key ingredient in Tosoh’s cement. The Nanyo Complex reuses or reprocesses virtually all of its industrial waste and sources general and industrial waste externally for use as fuel in operating its cement manufacturing facilities.
Tosoh’s final disposal volume for fiscal 2018 was 830 metric tons. This was 0.20% of its overall industrial waste volume of 424,215 metric tons.
Industrial Waste Emissions
Tosoh is dedicated to achieving the target established by the Japan Business Federation (Keidanren) for industrial waste disposal volume—a 70% reduction by 2020. In fiscal 2018, Tosoh disposed of 830 metric tons of industrial waste, which was far below the Responsible Care® (RC) target of 1,500 metric tons.
The company’s goal for fiscal 2019 is to dispose of no more than 1,000 metric tons of industrial waste.
Class 1 Chemical Emissions
Japan’s Pollutant Release and Transfer Register (PRTR) law requires businesses that deal with chemical substances to estimate and report the volume of chemical substances they emit. Tosoh complies with the law and works to reduce its emissions in the interest of contributing to a cleaner, healthier environment.
In fiscal 2018, Tosoh’s Class 1 chemical emissions totaled 576 metric tons. That marked decrease of 17 metric tons from fiscal 2017.
Atmospheric Preservation
Tosoh’s operation of boilers and furnaces that burn fuel results in the emission of smoke into the atmosphere that contains sulfur oxide (SOx), nitrogen oxide (NOx), and particulate matter. To mitigate the possible adverse effects on health from atmospheric emissions, Japan’s Air Pollution Control Act sets regulatory values for each such facility and applies a total volume control structure to each business unit. Tosoh has gone a step further. We work with the communities where we operate and forge agreements and formulate regulations for appropriate values for our local operations. We have also established our own stringent values in the interest of contributing to sustainable environmental preservation. We strive constantly to meet and better the various standards.
We did not exceed any regulatory values in fiscal 2018. Tosoh will continue to work harder to meet and better the values set forth in regulations and agreements.
Water Preservation
Japan’s Water Pollution Prevention Act and additional regulations based on drainage standards that govern effluent protect open coastal areas and closed bodies of water including Tokyo Bay, Ise Bay, and the Inland Sea where industrial activity is concentrated. Tosoh’s business units, in addition to complying with these and municipal effluent regulations and agreements, have established proprietary effluent values in the interest of sustainable environmental preservation.
Tosoh did not exceed any regulatory values in fiscal 2018, and will continue to work with greater effort to meet and improve upon the values established by regulations and agreements.
Minamata Convention Compliance
In October 2013, the world adopted the Minamata Convention on Mercury, a global treaty protecting people and the environment from potential mercury hazards. Signatories to the convention agree to ban the establishment of new mercury mines and to eradicate established mines, to reduce and eliminate in phases the use of mercury in products and manufacturing processes, and to control the emission of mercury on land and in water. As of May 2017, the Minamata Convention had the 50 signatories, including Japan, needed for ratification and was brought into force in August 2017.
In 2015, Japan’s government established the Act on Preventing Environmental Pollution of Mercury and implemented revisions to its Air Pollution Control Act and Law Concerning Waste Disposal and Scavenging. Its goal was to lead the world in the management of mercury.
Earlier, in 2013, Tosoh established an RC directive regarding mercury and since has worked to reduce and eliminate its mercury use and emissions. It has also developed products in light of the Minamata Convention and increasingly strict regulations for mercury, cadmium, and zinc. These include its TX-55 wastewater heavy metal treatment agent.
Tosoh will continue to pursue ways to reduce the concentration of mercury in smoke exhaust emitted from its boilers and cement kilns. It will also find improved methods for processing industrial waste containing mercury.