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What Are NEC's Environmentally Sound Products?

Activities are undertaken to reduce environmental impacts of products over their entire life cycles from procurement to use and disposal of products by customers. The perspectives of "Ecology" including "Resource recycling", "Global warming prevention", and "Environmental consciousness" and "Compliance" are added to "Quality," "Cost," and "Delivery" in these activities.

Eco Products

Development of Eco Products

What are eco products?

Eco products are products that are confirmed to have satisfied all of NEC's company-wide eco product standards, which cover the basic requirements for protecting and preserving the environment, in the assessments that are carried out by each division when new products are developed.

About Eco Products

What are Eco Symbol products?

Eco Symbol products are products that conform to the Eco Symbol standards and seek environmental advances and further environmental soundness among the eco products. Products conforming to the standard are affixed with the Eco Symbol mark in product catalogs, websites, and other places.

What are Eco Symbol Star products?

Eco Symbol Star products are products that are regarded as environmental top-runner products among the NEC products. These products conform to the stringent Eco Symbol Star standards such as reducing CO₂ emissions by 50% compared with conventional products. Products conforming to the standard are affixed with the Eco Symbol Star mark in product catalogs, websites, and other places.

Product Assessments

In 1994, NEC set company-wide product assessment guidelines and institutionalized a system to check against the environmental design requirements during assessment.
Its divisions have set and are operating implementation rules tailored to their own business and conditions based on the company-wide product assessment guidelines.
Assessment items for product assessment include energy-saving design, LCA, standards for environment-impacting materials contained in products, standards related to the 3Rs (reduce, reuse, and recycle), and other related items. The whole mechanism ensures comprehensive environmentally friendly design.
In addition, final assessment results are provided for the design and development phases so the results can be reflected in the goals and assessment criteria of future products.
All newly developed products of the NEC Group undergo 100% product assessment including computers and communication equipment.

Product Assessment Procedure

Flow of Product Assessment

Acquisition of ISO Environmental Label

Besides endeavoring to make our products eligible for our own environmental labels, the Eco Symbol and Eco Symbol Star, we are working to acquire the environmental labels of other countries. Various environmental labels have been established in Japan and in other countries of high environmental awareness such as those in Europe and North America. Acquiring the environmental labels of other countries helps give our products added environmental appeal among domestic and overseas customers.

ISO environmental labels Type I <ISO14024(JIS Q 14024)>
A system where the use of an environmental label (symbol mark) is awarded by a third-party organization in a neutral and indifferent position called the eco label steering group. The evaluation is based on a voluntary standard that takes into account the lifecycle of a product (lifetime from resource gathering to disposal).

Acquisition of ISO Type I Environmental Label

ISO environmental labels Type II <ISO14021(JIS Q 14021)>

The Eco Symbol and Eco Symbol Star are self-declaration type of ISO (International Standards Organization) environmental label (Type II). This is a label that is only put on products that satisfy the criteria set by each manufacturer group or other organization for products in specific fields.

About Eco products

Environmentally Sound Product (Eco Product) Standards

Thinking on life cycle

An effort is made to reduce environmental impact throughout the entire life cycle of a product.

Designation and reduction of environmental impacts of products LCA from procurement to disposal is targeted for similar product groups or applicable products in accordance with in-house guidelines.

Preventing global warming

Energy-saving designs are made and CO₂ emissions are measured to reduce CO₂ emissions during the use of products.

Energy-saving design  Reduction of power consumption of a product is equal to or below an absolute value or in performance ratio compared with a former product.
Conformance with regulations on energy-saving design at shipmentfs destinations

Green programs

Kinds and consumptions of materials contained in products that affect the environment are thoroughly measured and analyzed so as to control their use.

Reducing the use of environmentally harmful substances   Procurement of parts, products, and packaging materials conforms to requirements set in the in-house rules.
PVC (polyvinyl chloride) is not to be used in cases.
Bromine-based fire-retardant plastics are not to be used in external cases.
RoHS compliance  Conforms to the European RoHS Directive regardless of shipping country
The substance restrictions of the importing country and region are known and quantities exceeding those amounts are not used.

Resource recycling

Materials that can be recycled easily are used to the extent possible, and utilization of recycled materials is actively promoted to curtail emission of waste so as to contribute to a recycling-oriented society.

Resource conservation   Product mass or volume, mass and space usage are equivalent or less than conventional products.
Reusable parts and units are used.
Design that heeds material recycling without impairing function
Simplified disassembly    Design easy for detachment and disassembly of products
Design that makes disposal easy
The disassembly and detachment steps for recycling have been reduced.
Written procedures or drawings showing the disassembly method can be supplied anytime when requested by the customer or other parties.
Long term usability   The design considers longer service lives for products.
Material names are marked on plastic parts weighing 25 g or more in accordance with the in-house guidelines.
Cases and parts are standardized at the design stage for same product groups or successor models.
Manuals and packaging materials    Instruction manuals are digitized (websites and CD-ROMs). If not digitized, manuals are printed on recycled paper or paper that has acquired an environmental label, to reduce environmental impact.
Package cartons use recycled or recyclable materials.
Packaging materials are identified and marked in accordance with a method specified in the in-house rules. Markings also conform to related laws and regulations of countries and regions.
Packaging materials specified in a companywide standard or their equivalents are selected to trim kinds and types of packaging materials and to make packaging efficient.
Batteries   Batteries do not contain more than 0.0005% (5 ppm) of mercury by weight.
Conforming to the in-house rules that incorporate the requirements of laws of countries and regions
Structure that allows easy identification and removal by a recycler

Information disclosure

An effort is made to disclose environmental information correctly in a style that is easily understood by the customers.

Disclosure of product environmental information    Information such as environmental law regulation, guideline requirements or status of compliance, matters requiring environmental consideration, and appeal points is transmitted through the Internet, manuals, catalogs, specifications, and other media.
A check system is in place to validate information printed on product catalogs, manuals, and other printed matter to ensure that the information is suitable for printing.
Information on batteries such as battery type, location, and procedure for safe removal is printed on manuals and other places.
Information on product recycling is prepared for users and disposal facilities and conforms to requirements of countries and regions.

Management mechanism

Main production facilities establish an environmental management system.

Environment management systems Environment management systems (ISO 14001, EMAS, etc.) are available at the main product business entities (including development and design) and the main production facilities.
Manufacturing process When new chemical substances are introduced or when parts are used that require changes in production processes at the main production facilities of products, assessments are conducted.