— While pursuing CSR synergies based on the Group's common business, the NTT Group also needs to focus on environmental issues as an important CSR theme with global implications. What are your views on environmental initiatives?

Kanazawa: There are two ways to approach environmental issues. One is the effective use of ubiquitous broadband services and ICT, which we are currently promoting to enhance the productivity and energy efficiency of society. The other is to reduce the environmental impacts of our business activities.

Sakamoto: In terms of enhancing the energy efficiency of society as a whole, our goal of providing ubiquitous communications that enable people to access content and use services irrespective of time or place could reduce the need for movement of people and goods, and thus contribute to reducing energy consumption and CO₂ emissions. I think that Group-wide efforts to equip society with ubiquitous communications could in themselves make a major contribution.

Matsui: At DOCOMO, we offer remote monitoring and control solutions based on FOMA Ubiquitous Modules that can be used, for example, for monitoring and controlling electricity and gas facilities and managing vending machine inventory. Customers who currently use this service for remote vending machine inventory management give it high marks for enabling them to keep constant track of inventory and optimize delivery truck loads and schedules, resulting in a 12.5% reduction in CO₂ emissions.

Kanazawa: Based on such initiatives, the NTT Group has made the effective use of ICT one of the pillars of its efforts to reduce environmental impacts, and we've laid out a vision for leveraging such means to reduce the CO₂ emissions of Japan as a whole by 10 million tons by fiscal 2011. We also need to reduce CO₂ emissions from our own business activities through a Groupwide approach. After all, if our own business activities leave an increasingly large environmental footprint as we build our telecommunications platform and provide more services, we could hardly say that we're making a real contribution to society.

Sakamoto: Yes, the more ubiquitous communications become a reality, the steeper the rise in data traffic volume, which means more and larger data centers and a concomitant increase in electricity consumption. This is a serious issue for the whole telecommunications industry. We're currently working with other Group companies to address this problem, but we need to generate and leverage even greater synergy moving forward. In addition to using more energy-efficient power supply and air conditioning systems, we're also equipping our facilities with solar power systems and experimenting with green roofs.

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Sogo: Energy-saving at data centers is a good starting point for generating synergy. NTT DATA has launched Green Data Center services for maximizing the efficiency of existing resources and enhancing processing capacity by utilizing new technologies such as server virtualization^*, and installing solar power generation and high efficiency air conditioning systems. We're also working with NTT FACILITIES and other Group companies on testing power supply systems that enhance energy-saving.

* Server virtualization
A method of partitioning one physical server computer into multiple "virtual" servers, giving each the appearance and capabilities of running on its own dedicated machine

Wakaizumi: In the office buildings that we develop and operate, we install energy-saving fittings and equipment when they are built or renovated. Also, with the urban heat island effect becomes an increasingly serious issue in recent years, we are working with NTT FACILITIES to test the positive effects of green roofs.

Inoue: We use the Japanese word mottainai (which means "What a waste!") as a keyword to drive some of our initiatives for the environment, such as recycling and reusing communications equipment and PCs. I think other Group companies are doing the same, but if we can beef up such efforts systematically as a Group, we could probably make even more of a difference.

Tamura: I think green procurement also needs to be implemented even more stringently in future to buy the most environment-friendly equipment. The best equipment in terms of energy saving still costs a lot, but if the NTT Group sets the right example by making environment a top priority, I think it would send out a strong message to equipment vendors and society at large to do likewise.

Takano: I see the two approaches mentioned earlier by Mr. Kanazawa in terms of "development" and "utilization". I think we can have the greatest impact on society both by working with NTT FACILITIES and others on the development of power devices with low environmental impacts, and — as Mr. Tamura suggested — by defining and pursuing common themes within the NTT Group for adapting utilization to reduce the environmental footprint of our business activities.