Toyota's 2020 North American Environmental Report focuses on Carbon, Water, Materials and Biodiversity, plus Outreach. To give you a quick overview of some of our most noteworthy accomplishments in each of these areas, we provide highlights below. We hope some of these information tidbits inspire you to learn more about our efforts to minimize environmental impacts across our business and maximize positive outcomes.
CARBON
- As the next step in our electrification journey, Toyota announced the Toyota bZ4X SUV Concept, the first of a global series of battery electric vehicles to be introduced under the “Toyota bZ” brand umbrella.
- Toyota is committed to increasing U.S. sales of electrified vehicles to 70 percent by 2030 and making its manufacturing plants carbon neutral by 2035.
- TFS issued its sixth Asset-Backed Green Bond. Net proceeds from the $1.6 billion bond offering will be used to finance new sales and lease contracts for certain electrified Toyota passenger vehicles.
- TMNA reduced total Scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions by 22 percent over the last five years.
- Toyota installed solar arrays at three plants that are expected to generate 6,480,000 kWh of renewable energy annually – the equivalent of powering nearly 800 homes per year.
- Toyota entered into a power purchase agreement with Clearway Energy Group to purchase electricity from Black Rock, a 115 MW wind farm in West Virginia. Once the system begins generating power in 2022, Toyota is expected to offset 166.6 million kWh annually with renewable energy.
- Toyota and Kenworth rolled out 10 hydrogen-powered fuel cell electric heavy-duty trucks at the Port of Los Angeles. These trucks logged more than 8,000 in-service zero-emission miles in their first five months of operation.
WATER
- Toyota’s assembly plant in Indiana is saving an estimated 54 million gallons of fresh water per year by reusing wastewater during the paint pretreat process. That’s equal to the amount needed to supply drinking water to the entire state of Indiana for one month.
MATERIALS
- We recycled 93.2 percent of all waste in 2020 and disposed only 1.5 percent in landfills.
- TMNA reduced total waste generated by 13 percent over the last five years.
- Between 2017 and 2020, Toyota’s returnable shipping containers replaced the use of 65.1 million pounds of cardboard boxes. That’s the equivalent of 65,500 short tons of wood from 393,000 trees.
BIODIVERSITY
- Seventeen Toyota sites across North America have planted pollinator gardens to nurture monarch butterflies and other pollinator species. When factoring in other automakers and suppliers across North America, the number of sites with pollinator gardens increases to more than 200, thanks to the Pollinator Project Challenge.
- Once the nearly 9,000 trees planted by Toyota in commemoration of the Tokyo Olympics reach maturity at about 10 years old, they will sequester 200,000 pounds of carbon annually.
OUTREACH
- NEEF, with major support from Toyota, awarded $225,000 in grant funding to support four nonprofit organizations that will conduct biodiversity conservation projects on public lands within the California Floristic Province. This area of approximately 113,438 square miles is designated a hotspot, meaning it is home to a high diversity of plants and animals found nowhere else in the world.
- NEEF’s Restoration & Resilience grants, totaling $275,000 and funded solely by Toyota, supported the restoration of 879 acres of public lands affected by a natural disaster.
- Toyota provided $150,000 to WWF to support the development of the Wolakota Buffalo Range, specifically for the construction of 23 miles of perimeter fence. The range is expected to support a herd of 1,500 bison, which will be North America’s largest Native American owned and managed bison herd.
- In the 10 years of the National Mayor’s Challenge for Water Conservation, presented by Wyland Foundation and Toyota, a total of 4 million pledges have been made to save 19.3 billion gallons of water.
