June 5, 2012: Maruti Suzuki India marked World Environment Day by revealing its extensive environment strategy to bring down emissions of its operations and reduce greenhouse emission of its vehicles.
Shinzo Nakanishi, MD and CEO said, “We have a well thought-out plan to minimise resource use, to become a greener company and safeguard the environment. As we expand our business and put in newer facilities, our focus will be to adopt and invest in new environment-friendly technologies and practices to minimise the impact of our business on the environment.”
The broad components of the company’s evolved environment approach are:
Lower carbon footprint in manufacturing operations: The carmaker will bring down the carbon footprint of its manufacturing operations through improved operational efficiencies and constant innovation.
This approach has brought significant results. The power consumption per car, for instance, has come down by nearly 30 percent in Gurgaon in the past decade and by about the same percentage in Manesar in five years. It plans to improve its efforts in the area of energy efficiency, particularly for the upcoming production facilities like Manesar Plant C. In addition, Maruti is also helping its vendor partners to quickly adopt these energy efficient technologies. While 66 percent of Maruti Suzuki’s Tier 1 suppliers are ISO 14001 certified, the company aims to make 100 percent Tier 1 suppliers ISO 14001 certified by the end of 2012-13.
Identify, adopt and invest in new environment friendly technologies: Maruti has pledged to invest in new, cost-effective technologies that bring down greenhouse gas emissions at its facilities. The Manesar B plant commissioned in September 2011 is the first car plant in India that is 100 percent LED and is significantly more energy efficient than any of the other plants, including the Manesar A plant commissioned in February 2006.
For the Gurgaon facility, an energy audit team systematically identifies equipment and machinery with high energy consumption, and replaces it with more environment-friendly options.
Reduce carbon footprint of vehicles by enhancing fuel efficiency: As Maruti introduces new models, it continues to power them with next-generation engine technologies that assure high fuel efficiencies with lower emissions. In the new Swift and new Swift DZire, engineers have significantly reduced emissions by 4-5 percent per kilometre and enhanced efficiencies by working on vehicle aerodynamics besides adopting several innovative weight reduction techniques. Maruti says its recently introduced Ertiga MPV offers fuel efficiency of 20.77kpl.
Work closely with the government to formulate eco-friendly policies to curb greenhouse gas emission: Maruti is actively supporting the government in laying down a robust policy framework to promote electric and hybrid vehicles. It is also part of government efforts to introduce corporate fleet emission norms for 2015 and 2020.
Other eco-friendly measures include bringing down water consumption per car by 62 percent in the past decade in the Gurgaon plant and by almost similar levels in the last five years in Manesar. Furthermore, with the support of its vendors, the carmaker has been able to eliminate hazardous substances like mercury, lead, cadmium and hexavalent chromium from most of its models, and thus meet End of Vehicle Life norms much ahead of their introduction in India.