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- Stakeholder Dialog 2010
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The NTT Group is on track to achieve the targets for reducing environmental impacts up to fiscal 2011 set forth in its Principal Activity Plan Targets, and has drawn up a new vision for the environment to guide its activities up to fiscal 2021. The new vision sets targets for fiscal 2021 in the three areas of creating a low carbon society, implementing closed loop recycling, and conserving biodiversity. NTT Vice President Kaoru Kanazawa talks here with Professor Yoichi Kaya, Senior Vice President of the Research Institute of Innovative Technology for the Earth, about how the NTT Group should endeavor to serve society through its business activities as it strives to meet its new environmental targets.
Green of ICT: Creating a low carbon society
Achieving the fiscal 2011 global warming mitigation targets
Professor Yoichi Kaya, Doctor of Engineering
Senior Vice President of Research Institute of Innovative Technology for the Earth (RITE) Graduated from The University of Tokyo in 1957 and served as a professor of Electrical Engineering until 1995. He moved to Keio University in 1995 and served as a professor of Graduate School. He assumed current position in 1998. Field of specialization: system engineering on energy and environment.
Kaya NTT set itself fairly stiff CO2 emission reduction targets of 35% per subscriber for its telecommunications carriers and 25% per unit of sales for other group companies, but I hear that it is going to reach these targets in fiscal 2011. I think that's a tremendous achievement, and I'd like to know whether it was easy, or whether it's the result of some really serious toil.
Kanazawa We set our targets by adding some ambitious elements to what we considered to be achievable levels. We made it to where we are now as a result of our efforts in many different directions to reduce the amount of power consumed in our business activities. However, some elements have changed. For example we use the number of subscribers as the denominator for our telecommunications carriers, and in our base year of 1990, our mobile phone business had only just begun, whereas now we have over 50 million subscribers.
Kaya So the individual subscriber is your basic unit for expressing CO2 emissions?
Kanazawa Yes. It's more usual to use something like production volume or revenues, but we felt that emissions per subscriber is an easier concept to grasp where telecommunications carriers are concerned. However, we use sales as the denominator for non-telecommunications group companies like NTT DATA and NTT COMWARE.
Kaya I see.
Aiming to reduce CO2 emissions by at least 15% by fiscal 2021 under the new vision
Kaoru Kanazawa,
Senior Executive Vice President,
NTT Corporation
Kaya Under your new vision, you're aiming for a 15% reduction from the fiscal 2009 figure for total CO2 emissions from your own business activities - your “Green of ICT” approach - by fiscal 2021. Is reducing electricity consumption the main component of this effort?
Kanazawa Yes. Electricity accounts for over 90% of the power consumed by NTT, and since we'll be building more data centers and other facilities in line with business expansion, we'll see electricity consumption - in other words, CO2 emissions - rise along with subscriber numbers unless we make conscious efforts to further reduce them.
Kaya Yes, if your business expands, your electricity consumption is sure to rise considerably, which of course also means higher CO2 emissions. That's why you're aiming for a 15% reduction. But how does this square with the government's target of 25% reduction by fiscal 2021? The base year for that 25% is fiscal 1991, which works out at close to 30% compared with fiscal 2009, so isn't 15% a pretty easy target?
Kanazawa We did all sorts of calculations, and decided that a 25% reduction was not a realistic target. We felt that if we were going to set a target, it needs to be one that is achievable if we make the effort.
Kaya Governments tend to set the target up front, and then think about how to achieve it, while businesses tend to think first about how they can achieve reductions, and then set targets accordingly, and so I guess it's only natural that your respective targets differ. But this example brings home how high the government's target is.
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Green by ICT: Creating a low carbon society
Achieving the fiscal 2011 reduction target of 10 million tons of CO2
Kaya And what about your “Green by ICT” approach? This concerns indirect reductions in energy consumption that you enable by, for example, providing videoconferencing systems to businesses and such like, as opposed to reduction of your own energy consumption. How exactly do you measure these reductions?
Kanazawa Taking videoconferencing as an example, we compare the amount of energy required for travel to and from a meeting with the ICT energy consumed by a videoconference to calculate CO2 emission reductions. We also estimated reductions from teleworking, remote healthcare, and other such applications, and set ourselves the target for fiscal 2011 of reducing CO2 emissions across society by 10 million tons.
Kaya Ten million tons is almost 1% of Japan's total CO2 emissions. I really do think that ICT can have a big impact on reducing CO2 emissions in the present age.
Helping to reduce CO2 emissions by over 20 million tons by further expanding ICT utilization by fiscal 2021
Kaya Looking ahead, what kind of things do you think could best help to save energy?
Kanazawa Easy examples include electronic invoicing using the Internet, teleworking, videoconferencing, remote healthcare, and electronic application procedures. Ebooks, electronic publishing and such like also help reduce CO2 emissions that would otherwise be generated in conjunction with printing and transport, since paper would no longer be necessary.
Kaya I can see the potential, but when I think of the amount of paper that I use myself, I can't help feeling that ICT doesn't help that much. Don't you have any such concerns about the benefits of ICT use?
Kanazawa Well, take videoconferencing. I've been told that it could actually increase travel, since people who've hit it off through videoconferencing will be more likely to want to meet face to face. However, while I too had my doubts about ten years ago, the quality of the latest videoconferencing has improved to such an extent that you really do feel as if you're sharing the same space.
Kaya I must admit that the videoconferences that I've taken part in at a company where I serve as an outside director felt very natural, and people's facial expressions came across very clearly. Is teleworking taking off?
Kanazawa I think it's becoming more and more common among people taking childcare leave and people with disabilities and such like. We too are promoting teleworking within the company to set an example for others.
Kaya I'd like to see increasing use of teleworking and videoconferencing. Has any research been done on the extent to which they could replace more conventional work styles?
Kanazawa We've identified occupations that would best be suited to teleworking. We're starting with job areas such as R&D sections where people have a relatively free hand in deciding how they work, and with female employees raising small children.
Kaya I think that your fiscal 2021 target of a CO2 reduction of 20 million tons across society through “Green by ICT” is pretty ambitious. Do you really see increasing use of videoconferencing and teleworking leading to such CO2 reductions?
Kanazawa0 Yes, I do. Remember that use of various electronic media will also reduce paper and other energy consumption. Then there's the spread of smart grids, which will better enable both businesses and households to manage their energy consumption by making it more visible. In the healthcare field too, remote medical treatment, digital receipts, and such like will bring further reductions. Since we can't implement most of these applications on our own, we plan to forge alliances with other companies and organizations to make them a reality.
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Implementing closed loop recycling
Kaya Let's talk about your efforts to implement closed loop recycling now. Your target of reducing paper consumption by 30% or more from your fiscal 2009 level is ambitious and deserves praise, but I can't help feeling that it's unattainable unless you make some quite drastic changes in your business practices. Are you taking any measures to change the mindsets of your employees?
Kanazawa One example is the way almost all the documents prepared for the weekly directors' meeting are in digital form. We have stopped printing them out, and display them now on our PC screens. It felt strange at first, but we're used to it now. By instituting paperless meetings from the top, we aim to expand the practice to all meetings.
Kaya That's excellent. I don't think paper consumption can be reduced unless a company is prepared to take such bold steps.
Kanazawa Making one change involves all sorts of other changes, but I think we can do quite a lot if we set our minds to it.
Kaya I hope that you can implement a lot more paper-saving digitization moving forward.
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Conserving biodiversity
Kaya The third area that you're focusing on is conservation of biodiversity. What exactly are you doing in this respect?
Kanazawa We don't have any numerical targets in this area. However, we have to erect relay station steel towers on top of mountains or in national parks as part of our business operations, and carrying out environmental assessments and monitoring is the least we can do to fulfill our responsibilities. Our group companies are also involved in various activities that contribute to conserving biodiversity. For example, NTT East is making use of its expertise in overhead cable stringing to create wildlife pathways that bridge roads so that little animals like Japanese dormice can cross safely and avoid getting run over. NTT Communications disseminates information on the environment through its Kankyo goo portal site, and NTT DOCOMO conserves woodlands through its docomo Woods program.
Kaya So in effect each of you is leveraging the word “biodiversity” to express your commitment to protecting the environment as it relates to your respective businesses.
Kanazawa Yes. You might think that the NTT Group's business doesn't really have that much direct connection to biodiversity, but if you look into the details, there are all sorts of connections, and we want to actively contribute in those areas by leveraging our technology and other resources.
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About “Green with Team NTT”
Kaya In addition to the “of” and “by” in “Green of ICT” and “Green by ICT”, your vision for the environment also uses “with” as a keyword. What does this entail?
Kanazawa We use it in “Green with Team NTT”. whereas “of ” and “by” are concerned with reducing CO2 emissions in and through our business, “with Team NTT” refers to efforts to reduce CO2 emissions and other environmental impacts through activities outside our business. Team NTT means our employees and their families, former employees, and everyone else connected in some way or other to NTT. All these people represent a tremendous amount of manpower that is involved in all sorts of community activities such as cleanups and afforestation.
Kaya I've always thought that involving employees and their families in activities other than production or product-related activities is important to businesses. When you consider that the families of people who support industry are ordinary consumers, then we're all really the same people. If companies instill awareness of environmental issues in their employees, they in turn will pass that on to consumers, and I'm sure it could have a great impact. In that sense, I think the way NTT includes environmental contribution activities by its employees and their families in its activities is very worthwhile.
Kanazawa That's the whole point of our “Green with Team NTT” concept. Our employees and their families are involved in Operation Clean Environment community cleanup activities, recycling, and all sorts of other activities too.
Kaya Since NTT is part of the information rather than manufacturing industry, people tend not to associate it with CO2 emissions and the environment, but by talking with you, I realize now that you could have quite a large impact, especially by developing energy-efficient data centers and such like. Also there are probably many people who think that the videoconferencing that came up in our discussion of “Green by NTT” will never replace face-to-face meetings, but when you think about it, exchanging information and meeting directly to foster mutual understanding are two different things. I'd like to see you actively promoting telecommunications as a means of saving on the movement of people and goods, and implementing specific ideas and innovations too.
Kanazawa We will. The technology has now reached a level that can satisfy most people, and so now we'll be focusing on getting more and more people to use it.
Kaya In academia too, the number of international conferences is increasing all the time, and I often think that it would be great if we could use videoconferencing and other ICT to hold them. I look forward to seeing the NTT Group implement many more great ideas moving forward.
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