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Lexus' tireless environmental efforts have grown out of our genuine respect and concern for the earth's environment. Our concerns range from the gathering and transporting of raw materials to the processing and assembly of vehicle parts, and from the processes at our dealer locations to the handling of materials at the end of a vehicle's life.

Designed With Concern

The focus of Lexus design efficiency is to build a vehicle that is exceptionally lean in its use of raw materials, its fuel, and its impact on the environment - all while pushing the boundaries of performance, luxury and quality.

The design of lighter-weight vehicles means greater natural resource conservation, better fuel consumption, less emissions, reduced brake wear, improved handling and braking performance, and less scrap disposal. Lexus works to reduce weight without weakening the vehicle or eliminating desirable features through sophisticated computer modeling that allows excess material to be designed out during engineering. Extensive testing validates the strength and durability of each component before it goes into production.

Lexus pushes the frontiers of vehicle aerodynamic efficiency, using wind-tunnel-tuned, computer-modeled details to reduce aerodynamic drag. Engine and driveline sounds are analyzed and tuned exhaustively, and airflow sounds are investigated in the wind tunnel and on the road.

Lexus innovations ensure that power plants deliver maximum power from the minimum amount of fuel, with remarkably low exhaust emissions. Sophisticated VVT-i combustion management controls do all this, with the result that Lexus models meet Low Emission Vehicle (LEV) or the more stringent Ultra Low Emission Vehicle (ULEV) EPA certification standards.

Cleaner Manufacturing and Distribution

In-plant water use, waste volume and scrap material generation have been cut dramatically at Lexus plants, and improvements in plant energy efficiency help to reduce the greenhouse gases that are a by-product of power generation. All eight plants that build Lexus vehicles are ISO 14001 qualified, having received an internationally recognized certification for environmental management systems.

Lexus dealers are a part of this effort. The Lexus Environmental Assistance Network equips all dealers with a customized web site that provides up-to-date waste-management information. Dealers return numerous components for precision factory remanufacture and ultimate sale as rebuilt parts.

On The Road And Beyond

Plastic components used in the interiors and exteriors of Lexus vehicles are molded of a highly recyclable and lightweight material, Toyota Super Olefin Polymer. Its use has reduced by two-thirds the polyvinyl chloride used in the LS 430 during the current model's redesign. Lead and mercury, two of the more challenging substances to deal with when a car is dismantled, have been largely supplanted by environmentally preferable materials.

Lexus is improving recycling technology with facilities such as the Automobile Shredder Residue Recycling plant that recovers urethane foam, fiber, copper, glass and plastics. Vehicle dismantling methods and recycling technologies are being developed to allow Lexus vehicles to meet a vehicle material recovery rate of 95 percent by 2015.