Global Operations

Canada Oshawa Car Assembly Plant

 

Environmental Management Systems

The Oshawa Car Assembly Plant’s Environmental Management System (EMS) was first certified to the ISO14001 standard in December 2001 and achieved certification to the ISO14001:2004 standard in November 2005.  The EMS maintains it certification with periodic audits performed by a qualified 3rd party registrar.

ISO 14001 is the umbrella to implement a comprehensive EMS. It requires us to perform key job functions in a standardized way to minimize the impact on the environment, identify and implement ideas to reduce air emissions, non-recycled waste, energy consumption and water use.

The facility has adopted a slogan with the acronym “R.O.A.D.” to represent the key elements of their Environmental Policy. The letters in this acronym represent;

R = Respect the Environment
O = Obey the Law
A = Always Improve
D = Don’t Pollute

Examples of Car Assembly Plant efforts to reduce their impact on the natural environment include:

Reduction:

Voluntary Program Participation:
The new paint shop uses the latest paint technologies and abatement systems to reduce VOC emissions from the ELPO system, basecoat and clear coat paint processes. VOC emissions continue to decline in 2007 with the use of Regenerative Thermal Oxidizers (RTO’s) abatement technology.  VOC emissions have been reduced by 75% as compared to the old paint process used in 2005.  A powder prime process is used generating no VOC’s as each car receives its prime colour coating.

Non-recycled Waste
The plant has reduced the amount of non-recycled waste from 9.42 kgs/car in 2005 to 7.22 kgs/car at the end of 2007.  Implementation of Resource management and changing disposal methods for several waste streams helped reduce the amount of waste going to landfill in 2007.  In 2007 waste to landfills was reduced by 930,000 kgs as compared to the previous year.

Energy
2007 Energy projects reduced electrical consumption by 85,735,500 kilowatt hours as compared to the previous year.  Some of the projects completed in 2007 included installing fan timers on workstation cooling fans, turning off excess lights, performing energy audits, setting back compressed air to 80 psi on weekends, setting back the temperature on supplied air and reducing humidity levels in the paint process.

Water
2007 Water Saving projects reduced water consumption by 123,948,900 gallons over last year’s usage.  The projects to reduce water consumption include reducing humidity levels from 55% to 50 % in various paint shop areas and reducing the amount of water used in the Gas fill area for flushing.

Reuse:

Commodity Resource Program was started in 2007.  This program finds customers to buy our rejected and surplus parts allowing these parts to be reused and generate a new revenue stream instead of being recycled or scrapped.  Parts such as painted doors, hoods, wheel rims, wire harnesses and end of model year parts generate revenue for Oshawa Car Plant.  A full time Commodity Manager is on site working with our Quality Department and the Resource Manager to find new homes for the many parts that are either surplus or have been rejected from our processes.

Recycling:

Oshawa Car recycles over 44 waste items and continues to divert several thousand metric tonnes (MT) of material from landfill through line side and source separation of waste materials for recycling.

Materials sent for Recycling in 2007 include:

• 3531 MT of scrap metals
• 724 MT of cardboard
• 466 MT of plastics
• 303 MT of wooden pallets & scrap wood
• 264 MT of solvents (reclaimed for re-use)
• 226 MT Car and AGV Batteries
• 194 MT of paper
• 160 MT of powder prime
• 148 MT of metal drums
• 95 MT of vehicle fluids
• 48 MT of emulsified oil
• 44 MT of organic food waste
• 29 MT of electronic equipment & computers
• 27 MT of automotive glass
• 25 MT of aluminum pop cans and plastic bottles
• 7 MT of tires
• 5 MT of plastic drums