ENVIRONMENT
Mark Simpson:
Can I just add two
further benefits: the lack of particulates in
the atmosphere when people cook inside
with one of our stoves; and changed
patterns of wood collection. With three-
stone fires, people essentially chop down
whole trees and feed them into the fire.
Because our cook stoves are so efficient
and have only a relatively small opening,
they don't need so much wood. Now,
people tend to take branches off but leave
the trees standing. It’s phenomenal to see
reforestation occurring because people
are conserving their fuel source and just
trimming off what they need.
Jeremy Spencer:
Something else I’d
like to add is that when the children we
help get into education come home, they
generally study by the light of kerosene
lamps. Kerosene is a very smoky fuel
and a potent greenhouse gas. For a few
dollars, we can give them solar-powered
lamps, which again reduces emissions and
pollution. These are all little, marginal gains
that can completely change people’s lives.
PITR:
The social impact of these
projects is clearly enormous, but
what effect has Toshiba’s Carbon
Zero scheme had on emissions?
Jeremy Spencer:
I’m very proud to
announce that we’ve managed to offset
our first 100,000 tonnes of CO2 – that’s
just in the UK, not counting the projects
we run in Europe. We can also provide
partners with bespoke projects to support
their own green activities and have just
gone through Paris 2016 accreditation to
make our business carbon neutral.
What I really want to tell our partners
is that in addition to these outward-facing
initiatives, our entire product development
is geared to making sure our products
consume as little energy as possible. For
example, we make sure our products have
sleep modes, sensible sleep modes, and
automatic duplexing to save paper. It’s very
important for us that our technology is
aligned with our environmental message.
Paul Chipling:
That’s an important part of
the carbon hierarchy: to calculate, manage
and understand your carbon footprint;
to reduce it where possible through
technology, innovation and education;
and then to offset it through high impact
projects. You have to follow that hierarchy
of carbon management, which is just what
Toshiba is doing.
PITR:
A comprehensive approach
like that is especially important
considering the bad press that
carbon offsetting has had in the past.
Mark Simpson:
It has had a bad press
over the years, and you’ll always get
people who pick on things. However, if
you look at what came out of the Paris
agreement, article 6 is all about carbon
offsetting and carbon trading.
PITR:
How have Toshiba’s customers
reacted to the scheme?
Jeremy Spencer:
Very positively. Some
people had the attitude of ‘Do we really
need this?’, but once you sit down and
explain things in granular detail, they really
do appreciate it. Many customers have
brought our schemes into their own CSR
programmes. We deliver carbon neutral
products to them and give them the
opportunity to offset the paper and energy
consumed in the usage phase.
Paul Chipling:
The projects sell the story.
It’s basically a win-win: the customer gets
a great quality Carbon Zero MFP and at
the same time helps people in the poorest
parts of the world, effectively supplying
them with clean water, clean cooking and
saving them time so that they can start
new enterprises, go to school, have more
play time.
PITR:
100,000 tonnes sounds a lot;
can you give us some idea of what
that means in a way that people can
understand?
Paul Chipling:
It’s equal to the annual
carbon emissions of 70,000 homes. Or,
from a project perspective, it’s equal
to putting 15,000 stoves into Kenya
and improving the lives of hundreds of
thousands of people, or providing 18.1
million litres of clean water to villagers in
Uganda. That’s an astonishing figure.
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