Amid mounting concern over specified chemical substances in products, the Sanyo Group made it a priority to conduct a survey on chemical substances with a high environmental impact, including the six substances specified by RoHS Directive*1 and has been replacing these with safer substances. Consequently, Sanyo completed the removal of all six specified chemical substances from products produced in Japan and those for the EU market at the manufacturing stage by the end of December 2005. In addition, Sanyo has also responded to J-Moss*2, China RoHS*3 and chemical regulations in the State of California, USA; Korea and other regions.
In order to comply with all these regulations, Sanyo has constructed a system for managing chemical substances contained in products and set internal rules applicable to the entire Sanyo Group to control the chemical substance data of each procured material and product.
To be successful in efforts to eliminate chemical substances in products, it is vital to have the cooperation of suppliers. In line with this, in fiscal 2006 Sanyo started evaluation of the chemical substance management system of suppliers and offering instructions, in addition to management based on "Consent to non-use" and "Certificate of non-use" for procured materials in accordance with the "Sanyo Group Management Standards for Environmentally Hazardous Substances" Thus, Sanyo is working to ensure data reliability.
*1. Restriction of the use of certain Hazardous Substances in electrical and electronic equipment (RoHS), a directive of the EU: Lead, mercury, cadmium, hexavalent chromium, polybrominated biphenyl (PBB), and polybrominated diphenyl ether (PBDE) are the six hazardous substances.
*2. Japan – The Marking for presence Of the Specific chemical Substances for electrical and electronic equipment (J-Moss): This is the commonly used term for the Japanese JIS C 0950 standard, which specifies the marking for presence of the specific substances in electrical and electronic equipment.
*3. Administration on the Control of Pollution Caused by Electronic Information Products (ACPEIP), or “China RoHS”: This law requires the disclosure of the six hazardous substances specified under the RoHS Directive during phase one, followed by a ban on the use of these substances in phase two. As of July 2009, phase one of the law is in effect.
