NSK Ltd.
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NSK Presented with the Award of the Director-General of the Industrial Science and Technology Policy and Environment Bureau, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry at the Eco-Efficiency Awards 2009
NSK Ltd. (NSK; Headquarters: Tokyo, Japan; President and CEO: Norio Otsuka) won the Award of the Director-General of the Industrial Science and Technology Policy and Environment Bureau, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) at the Eco-Efficiency Awards 2009, hosted by the Japan Environmental Efficiency Forum (Chairperson: Ryoichi Yamamoto, Professor, Institute of Industrial Science, the University of Tokyo; Secretariat: Japan Environmental Management Association for Industry). This award, the top prize, was given in recognition of Neco (NSK Eco-efficiency Indicators), unique environmental efficiency indicators that NSK developed to quantitatively measure the ecological friendliness of NSK products. NSK was presented with the prize at Eco-Products 2009 on December 11.
Neco, for which NSK won the award, is a set of indicators that NSK introduced in 2008 to measure the ecological friendliness of all NSK products using its own unique calculation formulas. These indicators enable NSK to quantitatively measure how much an individual NSK-developed product can contribute to the environment. They do so by demonstrating how much better the product can perform than its predecessor in terms of ecological efficiency using numerical values obtained by dividing product value (life and performance of the product) by the environmental burden it creates (weight and power consumption of the product).
NSK received this prize not only because Neco has helped stimulate ecological innovations by numerically demonstrating the environmental friendliness of products and so enabling all products to be evaluated using virtually the same indicators, but also because it can be applied to technological developments, helping NSK to communicate the ecological friendliness of its products to its business partners.
As a manufacturer, NSK will continue to carry out the corporate activities that it is engaged in to contribute to the creation of a more sustainable society that will be both economically rich and friendly to the environment through its constant pursuit of products and services of the highest quality that are as reliable and energy efficient as possible.
Eco-Efficiency Awards
Sponsored by METI, the Eco-Efficiency Awards were launched in 2005 to help contribute to the further growth of Japanese industries. These awards are intended to simultaneously promote both environment issues and the economy, while also strengthening Japanese businesses using less energy and fewer resources than in other countries so as to increase the competitiveness of Japanese companies and encouraging technological innovations with a view to achieving greater ecological efficiency.
This award is presented in recognition of either corporate activities that contribute to improving socioeconomic conditions while also helping to reduce environmental impact or products produced as a result of such activities.