YOKOHAMA, Japan – Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. shared the progress report on its recycling/recovery efforts in Japan for fiscal year 2013 (April 2013 to March 2014). Nissan announced its recovery results for Automobile Shredder Residue (ASR), airbag-related products, and fluorocarbons recovered from end-of-life vehicles (ELVs) in accordance with the Japan Automobile Recycling Law (*1).
In FY2013, Nissan recovered 112,507.2 tons of the 115,741.4 tons of ASR collected from 533,836 vehicles in Japan – an amount that represents a recovery ratio of 97.2% – which achieves the Japan Automobile Recycling law ASR recovery target rate of 70% by FY2015 for eight consecutive years. The recovery ratio for ELVs (actual value) stands at 99.5% (*2). Nissan also reduced the amount of ASR-related landfill and incineration disposal to zero (*3) and participated in a trial of recycling ASR, with an advanced method of sorting ASR and process them as resources (*4).
Nissan recovered 1,603,679 airbag-related products from 445,635 vehicles through recovery processing and on-board deployment operations (*5). The airbag recycling ratio stood at 94.1%, exceeding the legal requirement of 85%. A total of 138,602.149 kg of fluorocarbons collected from 490,825 vehicles was processed.
The cost of the recycling efforts for these specified materials amounted to 5,400,091,730 yen. Recycling fees and income generated from the fund for vehicle recycling totaled 6,286,540,805 yen, contributing to a net surplus of 886,449,075 yen. From FY2004 to FY2013, the total cost of recycling operations led to a net surplus of 2,987,067,988 yen, an amount that is equivalent to 560 yen per vehicle. For the mid- and long-term forecast, Nissan anticipates the cost of recycling operations to stabilize.
Consistent with the Nissan Green Program 2016, the company’s mid-term environmental plan, Nissan will continue efforts to improve its ELV recycling actions to achieve a top-level ELV recovery rate in Japan. With active utilization of ASR recycling facilities, Nissan continued to achieve zero ASR-related disposals to landfill and incineration since FY2012. It will continue to work toward achieving an ASR recovery ratio of 100%.
*1: The Japan Automobile Recycling Law: Article 27.2 of Automobile Recycling Law and Article 29 of Enforcement Regulations (Law Concerning Recycling Measures of End-of-life Vehicles). The law went into effect on January 1, 2005.
*2: Basis for calculation: Nissan’s recovery ratio for ELVs (actual value) stood at 81.6%, according to materials distributed in May 2003 by the government. The balance of 18.4% represents ASR recovery. At an 81.6% recovery rate for ASR (18.4%), the combined effective recovery rate is calculated at 99.5%. Recovery Rate 99.5% = 81.6%+ (18.4% x 97.2%).
*3: Excludes disposal of residues produced at the time of recycling at ASR recycling facilities, which conform to the standards.
*4: Nissan provided ASR needed by `Demonstration test project of recycling and liquefaction of plastic derived from ASR with optical sorter’ for FY2013 Automobile Recycling Advancement Project (Ministry of Environment)
*5: On-board deployment operations: One of the methods for airbag recycling is when airbags are left on the vehicle to be activated later.
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