Back in the 1800s, Sumitomo's copper refinery in Besshi on Shikoku Island produced harmful sulfurous gas. In 1913, Sumitomo developed technologies that enabled processing this gas to make fertilizer. The use of technology to solve environmental problems is a tradition at Sumitomo.
In addition to making efforts at reducing greenhouse gas emissions during our manufacturing activities, our products contribute to our customers' development of eco-friendly products.
Eco-friendly technology developmentWe allocate around 80% of R&D expenses of the Corporate Research & Development Laboratories to environment-related research development.  |
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World lowest level of energy consumption per ton of crude oilOur energy consumption per ton of crude steel in fiscal 2009 was 18% less than it had been in fiscal 1990 and at the world's lowest level. The same holds true for CO2 emissions.
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Our seamless pipe production, which is under construction in Brazil, will use charcoal made from eucalyptus trees as reducing agents of iron ore. The volume of CO2 that the eucalyptus trees at our contracted plantations absorb when growing is projected to be nearly equivalent to the volume of CO2 emitted during steelmaking operations. This can be evaluated as close to zero net emission of CO2 in reduction steelmaking.
In June 2008, for the second consecutive year, Sumitomo Metals received a Development Bank of Japan (DBJ) loan based on it being rated at the highest grade in the DBJ's environmental rating schedule, i.e., among "companies with particularly impressive environmental programs." We became the first steelmaker to attain such grade. Such favorable evaluation of our environmental management and measures has enabled us to obtain better terms and conditions of loans.
