January 09, 2025
Despite claims to be moving to carbon neutrality, Toyota’s Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions increased in 2023, following the same upwards trend in 2022. This is according to their most updated sustainability report, quietly released under the radar.
Toyota reported 2023 emissions of 592.89 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent, meaning it has overtaken Germany as a source of emissions. If Toyota was regarded as a country, Toyota would be placed just behind Saudi Arabia, as the 9th biggest emitter in the world.
The manufacturer’s 2022 vs 2023 growth in emissions was 6.76 million tonnes of CO2e. Just this increase in their CO2 is more than the national emissions of 80 climate vulnerable countries that pleaded their cases for decarbonisation at this year’s COP 29 climate summit.
Not only did the Japanese carmaker’s year-on-year emissions increase, but the company also revised upwards all its previous annual emissions estimates, meaning the company’s cumulative climate impact is higher than it previously declared to the public. Their 2022 emissions estimate has been revised upwards from 575 metric tons to 586.13 metric tons, a significant increase of 11.13 metric tons.
The total increase from what Toyota previously reported as their 2022 emissions, to the current estimate of 2023 emissions, is a larger 17.89 million tonnes of CO2e - more than 115 countries’ national emissions.
Toyota’s Scope 3 Category 11 emissions (vehicle use-phase), which make up the majority of all Toyota GHG emissions, only improved by less than 1% between 2022 and 2023. According to the company, the 2023 Scope 3 Category 11 emissions results is a 10.3% reduction from 2019 levels, but there is still a long way to go to meet Toyota’s own goal of a 33.3% reduction (compared to 2019), to be aligned with a 2°C warming scenario.
Eoin Dubsky is a campaigner at Ekō, a global organisation that holds corporations to account for their actions, and he said: “Toyota continues to fall further behind its rivals that are rapidly switching to producing and selling zero-emission Battery Electric Vehicles. Even worse, the company continues to aggressively lobby governments – especially in developing countries - to block, delay and weaken climate action.”
Why Toyota’s increasing emissions matter to humanity
A researcher at Columbia University assessed the mortality cost of carbon, taking the relationship between carbon emissions and heat-related deaths, to understand the cost of emissions in human lives.
This model estimates that every 1 million metric tonnes of CO2 emitted in 2020 will cause an additional 226 excess temperature-related deaths from 2020 to 2100 in the baseline emissions scenario.
Toyota’s 2023 total emissions of 592.89 million metric tons would in this model cause around 134,000 excess heat deaths by 2100.
Toyota’s failing EV strategy and multi-pathway approach continue to fail the environment
In October, the very same month that Toyota released its sustainability report, the company was reported to be delaying its US electric vehicle strategy, following September reports that it had cut its 2026 global Battery Electric Vehicles (BEV) production target by 33% from 1.5 million to 1 million. This report continues to highlight Toyota’s failing electric vehicle strategy.
While Toyota notes that 37.4% of its vehicles sold globally in 2023 were “electrified”, the vast majority of these were gasoline-powered hybrids (34.9% of its global sales). Only 1.1% of its global sales last year were BEVs, and only 1.4% PHEVs, with only 4,023 (less than 0.1%) Fuel Cell Electric Vehicles (FCEV).
China is the single largest car market globally, with annual new car sales of ~30 million vehicles, and is therefore critically important for major automakers. China also leads the world in terms of BEV market share, making up approximately a quarter of the country’s annual new car sales.
The overall Chinese market grew by 6.1% between the first half of 2023 and the first half of 2024, but with the rise of domestic BEV players, foreign automakers have had a tough first half of the year, with sales declining 20.5% for Toyota. The clear peril of this for an established automaker is that it misses growth in BEVs and is constantly battling hybrid developments from existing competitors.
The full 2023 Toyota sustainability report is available via: https://global.toyota/pages/global_toyota/sustainability/report/sdb/sdb24_en.pdf
For media queries:
- Eoin Dubsky, Eko Campaigner:
E-mail - eoin@eko.org and Phone: +31641636410 - Ben Scott, Head of Automotive at Carbon Tracker:
E-mail - bscott@carbontracker.org and Phone: + 44 (0)203 6330421
Editors’ notes
For additional context into Toyota’s emissions, please see below:
Dumping vehicles into unregulated markets
Toyota’s sustainability report also confirms that it continued to dump its most polluting vehicles in countries with no fuel economy or CO2 standards in 2023. Toyota’s vehicle sales with the highest average disclosed CO2 emissions globally were in South Africa and Australia - with Australian fuel economy standards only set to begin in January 2025.
Toyota unwilling to adopt cleaner and more sustainable BEV technology
Toyota insists on forging ahead with its multi-pathway approach, which includes petrol-hybrid and fuel cell vehicles. According to Korean consultancy SNE Research, global sales of hydrogen-powered FCEVs fell by more than 30% last year, a fact that is not deterring Toyota from purporting its hydrogen cars are part of the transition to cleaner mobility.