Nomura Real Estate and Daikin Industries Launch Initiative for Collection and Resource Recovery of Used Commercial Air Conditioners

Nomura Real Estate Co., Ltd. (Head Office: Minato-ku, Tokyo / Representative Director and President: Daisaku Matsuo, hereinafter “Nomura Real Estate”) and Daikin Industries, Ltd. (Head Office: Osaka, Osaka Prefecture / Representative Director and President & COO: Naofumi Takenaka, hereinafter “Daikin”) have commenced a demonstration initiative for collecting used existing air conditioners generated during building demolition and air conditioning renovation work, and connecting them to appropriate dismantling and resource recovery. This initiative aims to promote the resource recovery of waste towards the realization of a circular economy. Currently, as the first phase of this initiative, the collection and resource recovery of used air conditioners generated during building demolition and renovation are being advanced at multiple properties, including the redevelopment project of the Shibaura Project (Minato-ku, Tokyo).

1. Background and Purpose of this Initiative

The construction and real estate industries are sectors with a very high environmental impact due to their enormous resource consumption and large volume of waste generation. To solve this problem, it is necessary to actively promote the reuse and recycling of materials and build a system for circular resource utilization. In the lifecycle of buildings, used air conditioners generated during building demolition and renovation of existing facilities contain recyclable materials such as aluminum and copper, and proper collection and processing can contribute to waste reduction and resource circulation.

2. Overview of this Initiative

Conventionally, when demolishing buildings or renovating air conditioners in existing buildings, removed air conditioners were collectively crushed and sorted by industrial waste disposal companies (hereinafter “waste disposal companies”). However, this method was limited to rough sorting into categories such as iron, non-ferrous metals, and resins. In this case, for example, heat exchangers, which are one of the components of air conditioners and are composed of copper and aluminum, could not be finely sorted and were limited to reuse through downcycling*1 to other applications.

In this initiative, used air conditioners will be collected by Daikin Sunrise Settsu Co., Ltd. (hereinafter “DSS”), a group company of Daikin, and at DSS, the air conditioners will be dismantled and sorted by component, and resources will be recovered. DSS performs manual dismantling and sorting, and by handing over each component to an appropriate processing company, it becomes easier to sort materials such as iron and copper than with conventional processing, enabling resource recovery with a high recycling rate.

Nomura Real Estate and Daikin have been conducting this initiative experimentally, starting with the collection of used air conditioners generated at demolition sites in Tokyo*2, including the redevelopment project of the Shibaura Project (demolition of Hamamatsucho Building)*3, and at office buildings in Osaka City, confirming the effectiveness of this initiative.

*1 A recycling method in which regenerated materials are used in products with lower quality and performance requirements than their original use.
*2 Nomura Real Estate and Daikin conducted a trial within the framework of “point0,” a platform established by Daikin to promote co-creation/collaboration among companies from different industries through demonstrations and data utilization in offices.
*3 Press Release May 11, 2026 https://www.nomura-re.co.jp/chtml/news/6661.html

3. Environmental Benefits

Compared to dismantling and sorting by waste disposal companies (dismantling and sorting by heavy machinery), manual dismantling and sorting enable higher purity resource recovery in addition to improving the recycling rate. The collection results of this initiative (case study of collection at an office building in Osaka City) are as follows.

4. Future Policy

Through this initiative, it has become clear that there are differences in the removal methods of existing facilities, industrial waste treatment processes, and recycling quality depending on the building scale and construction type (building demolition/renovation work). Nomura Real Estate, in cooperation with Daikin, will actively consider waste reduction and environmental impact reduction in future demolition and renovation work accompanying its own development. Nomura Real Estate and Daikin aim to realize a sustainable society in the construction field by reducing waste at construction sites and promoting resource reuse.