156
Parts Manufacturers Have a Major Presence
Uchiyamada Environmental Challenge 2050 is the same. Given that we aren’t
necessarily going to get the capital from somewhere, we need to keep earning
money while we also try to hit our targets.
On this point, I think the question of whether or not parts manufacturers are
going to compete over research and development plays an extremely big role. All of
the main components for the first-generation Prius were developed and manufactured by Toyota. However, once parts manufacturers come to think of this as a new
business opportunity, the total number of engineers involved increases dramatically.
Those people all wind up competing for us. In that sense, we fully recognize the
importance of our stakeholders.
The Environmental Challenge 2050 is not a matter of Toyota arbitrarily coming
up with targets that we can achieve through our own efforts. Collaborating with
equipment makers, parts manufacturers, and distributors among other is indispensable. Furthermore, in the years ahead energy companies will also be part of it. To
reduce the CO 2 emissions of new vehicles to zero, we naturally are keeping an eye
on developments with fuel-cell powered vehicles, for example, as well as would-be
“hydrogen society” The questions of whether Japan as a country can make hydrogen part of its core infrastructure and whether the energy industry will wade into the
field are extremely important. Nobody is going to build a hydrogen-fueling station
if you ask them to do it just because Toyota has built a fuel-cell powered vehicle. We
are doing this because once everyone thinks that hydrogen is going to become an
important part of the infrastructure we would then decide to put out vehicles that use
hydrogen.
Komiyama Zero at the plants, too, is a difficult numerical target.
Uchiyamada The biggest problem when it comes to manufacturing automobiles
with zero CO 2 emissions is the furnaces. Drying furnaces for paint and so on.
Interview
Précédent

- 202/225

Suivant