To Our Stakeholders
Since our founding in 1930, Iwatani Corporation has provided a wide range of products and services for both daily life and industrial applications, including energy, industrial gases, and materials, based on our corporate philosophy: Become a person needed by society, as those needed by society can prosper. These efforts are grounded in our desire to contribute to society by creating new value society will need in the future. This is the major driving force underlying the progress of our businesses.
Since 1941, when we identified hydrogen as the ultimate clean energy source, we have pushed for progress toward widespread use of hydrogen energy. Under the corporate slogan adopted in 1970 on the 40th anniversary of our founding－Creation of a more comfortable space on the Earth is what Iwatani wishes and strives for－we strive to deliver solutions to the social issues posed by environmental issues, as well as help achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), through contributing to create a carbon-free society based on hydrogen.
As a co-representative of the Japan Hydrogen Association established in December 2020 and as a key member of the Hydrogen Council established chiefly by global energy firms, we are acting to promote use of hydrogen around the world with the aim of moving toward a hydrogen energy-based society.
To stimulate new hydrogen demand, we are developing hydrogen-refueling stations in Japan and in the United States in response to the spread of fuel cell vehicles (FCVs). We will focus on developing hydrogen-refueling stations for fuel cell commercial vehicles, including trucks and buses, as well as reducing operating costs by promoting self-service refueling.
We are securing new hydrogen demand by meeting customer needs to reduce carbon emissions through means including factory decarbonization and hydrogen supply as a fuel to enable real-world means of transportation and mobility, whether by train, marine craft, or other, at large scale.
Our efforts to secure CO2-free hydrogen sources include studying the commercialization of green liquid hydrogen production alongside our partners, including a power utility and a mining company in Australia. In particular, the Liquefied Hydrogen Supply Chain Commercialization Demonstration Project in which we participate has been selected by the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) for funding from the Green Innovation Fund. This project will include feasibility studies on developing global liquid hydrogen supply chains integrating hydrogen production, liquefaction, shipping, marine transport, and receipt to establish the world's first large-scale hydrogen liquefaction and transport technologies capable of handling capacities on the order of tens of thousands of tons per year.
In Japan, we are participating in the Fukushima Plan for a New Energy Society, a project intended to produce green hydrogen using electric power generated from renewable energy sources. We are also studying a broad range of practical projects, including hydrogen production from plastic waste.
Our main LPG business has a customer base of more than 3.3 million households across Japan. We support our customers' lives in various aspects, including stable supplies, solutions, security, community contributions, and the environment. We are making energetic progress to achieve LPG decarbonization through various efforts, including research on decarbonization through supplying LPG mixed with hydrogen as well as propanation (synthetic green LPG production) as we head toward becoming the energy & living total service provider of choice for our customers and communities.
As we advance toward our 100th anniversary and beyond, we remain firmly committed to achieving sustained growth, and will continue to offer new value to all our stakeholders.
Chairman and CEO
President