Responsible Care
1. Responsible Care Policy
(1) Policy
Seeing occupational safety, security and accident prevention, environmental conservation, and product safety as key foundations for its business activities, the JSR Group conducts all business undertakings under the following Responsible Care® (RC) policy.
- 1.We strive to ensure the safety of employees and local communities, and to contribute to environmental conservation and a sustainable global environment by ascertaining risks associated with our business activities and executing countermeasures.
- 2.We strive to comply with laws, ordinances, and voluntary regulations by gathering information on and ensuring the full development of laws and regulations required for business activity.
- 3.We strive to ensure the safety of our products by developing products with consideration for safety, health, and the environment and providing information about them.
(2) International Initiatives
JSR Signs Declaration Supporting RC Global Charter
The Responsible Care (RC) Global Charter is a voluntary activity policy adopted by the International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA) and shared by the chemical industry to enhance and reinforce RC activities around the world.
JSR subscribes to this activity policy, and has signed a declaration supporting the RC Global Charter in October 2008. JSR has also signed the revised RC Global Charter in March 2015. By signing this declaration, JSR has committed itself to making even greater contributions to health, safety, and environmental preservation not just in Japan, but around the world.
2. RC Advancement Structure
Led by the officer in charge of safety, quality and environmental affairs, the Environment, Safety and Quality Committee formulates activity policies and action plans concerning JSR Group’s environment, safety, quality, product safety, chemical management, and other matters and manages the results of those activities.
For the execution of concrete operations, the Environment, Safety and Quality Committee sets up various meetings and committees and then proceeds according to plans.
Additionally, contents deliberated on and approved by this Committee are presented to the Sustainability Promotion Committee, of which the President serves as the chairperson.
Note: The Environmental Dept. and Safety Management Dept. were combined into the Environmental and Safety Dept. in April 2022.
3. Environment and Safety Management
(1) Compliance
When environmental and safety laws are adopted, enacted, or amended, the Head Office distributes information to each business site to keep them fully informed. The JSR Group identifies laws and regulations requiring compliance based on compliance regulations and conducts annual self-checks to ensure that business departments conform with laws and regulations.
Additionally, we actively promote all plants to acquire plant and operator certification under Japan’s Fire Service Act and Industrial Safety and Health Act in order to strengthen our safety management systems, prevent accidents, and improve our responses to emergencies. We will continue to maintain and upgrade certifications with the aim of improving safety and preventing accidents.
(2) Environmental Management System
By 1999, all three main domestic JSR plants had acquired ISO 14001 certification, an Environment Management System that supports environmental management. We have kept our certifications up to date each year since. We completed our compliance with the ISO 14001 revisions that were released in September 2015 at all three of our plants by January 2018.
JSR Group companies, mainly manufacturing companies, have also obtained ISO 14001 certification, and are promoting environmental conservation activities using a management system that complies with this standard.
| JSR (3 locations) |
Domestic Group companies (6 companies) |
Overseas Group companies (10 companies) |
|---|---|---|
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(3) Safety Management System
JSR has established and operates a safety management system tailored to the unique situation of each business site. This system sets forth procedures and rules on accident prevention and occupational safety pursuant to the Safety Management Regulations.
To verify the effectiveness of this management system, we conduct Headquarters Environment and Safety Audits headed up by the President, while each business site takes the lead in carrying out internal safety audits and patrols along with management reviews regularly every year in an effort to achieve continuous improvement.
We have also compiled a manual that describes appropriate and effective actions should an accident occur and ways to prevent damages from escalating.
As of March 2022, four business sites at JSR Group companies had obtained ISO 45001 certification.
(4) Audits
Headquarters Environment and Safety Audits and Certified High-Pressure Gas Establishment Audits
JSR regularly conducts audits of the company’s plants and research laboratories, with the President acting as head of the auditing team, every year. In FY2015, we switched to a style whereby issues and challenges faced by audited departments are shared and discussed. We also set up opportunities for dialogue between top management and employees so that the two sides can share thoughts in an effort to stimulate environmental and safety activities.
Similar to FY2020, all business sites of JSR (Yokkaichi Plant, Chiba Plant, Kashima Plant, Tsukuba Research Laboratories) were targeted in these audits conducted in FY2021. Given the COVID-19 pandemic, we conducted audits virtually and postponed onsite inspections as was the case in the previous year. Audits used key points of emphasis to confirm the compliance status of each business site based on risk-based process safety (RBPS).
Furthermore, Headquarters Environment and Safety Audits on Group companies were postponed due to COVID-19 pandemic and in consideration of the transfer of the elastomers business.
In our Certified High Pressure Gas Establishment Audits, we found no cases of non-compliance at any of the targeted business establishments.
Details on the Safety Audits and Certified High-Pressure Gas Establishment Audits are available at the following link.
(5) Environment Merit Award
At JSR, to further encourage environmental protection activities, we created the Environment Merit Award for employees who have made important contributions to environmental protection through a range of activities that include environmental product and technology development, environmental impact reduction, and assisting local communities with environment-related issues. Twenty-eight employees received this award for seven areas of excellence in FY2021.
| Business establishment | Description |
|---|---|
| Yokkaichi Plant | Reduction of sludge emissions by reducing drainage load |
| Yokkaichi Plant | Reduction of GHG emissions from coal-fired boilers following introduction of advanced control system |
| Yokkaichi Plant | Reduction of waste emissions from boilers by optimizing fuel coal type |
| Yokkaichi Plant | Reduction of waste emissions by converting non-standard goods into valuable materials |
| Chiba Plant | Reduction of high concentration PCB waste by establishing a sorting and disassembly process for PCB stabilizers |
| Yokkaichi Plant | Reduction of CO2 emissions by removing filter blockages |
| Kashima Plant | Improvement of work environment by changing the solvent used for rubber product testing |
4. Stakeholder Engagement
By identifying new issues through dialogue with stakeholders and making continuous improvement applying the PDCA cycle, we aim to fulfill stakeholder needs and to help build a better society. Please access the links below for more details.
5. Disclosure of Legal and Regulatory Violations
In FY2021, there were no legal violations by JSR with regard to laws on the environment, safety, quality, product safety and chemicals.
We continue to implement measures to prevent recurrences of past incidents and we strive toward prevention by regularly sharing case studies in legal and regulatory violations including those involving other companies.
What is RC?
RC is an acronym for Responsible Care®. In the chemical industry, each company handling chemical substances is responsible for ensuring that safety, health, and environmental issues are addressed throughout the chemical lifecycle, from development and production to distribution, use, and disposal, publishing the results of their activities and maintaining dialogue and communication with society - all voluntarily. This initiative is called "Responsible Care."
Started in Canada in 1985, Responsible Care is practiced in the chemical industries of 62 countries and regions of the world (as of 2017). It has attracted considerable international attention as a unique initiative unseen in other industries, and is even encouraged in an action plan (Agenda 21) for implementation by countries and related international organizations to achieve sustainable development in the 21st century that was adopted at the “Earth Summit” (United Nations Conference on Environment and Development) held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in June 1992.
