Volkswagen Summit Brings Together Experts to Discuss Environmental Strategy

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Group has concluded a two-day conference in Wolfsburg that brought together 400 environment experts from VW Group to discuss the company's future sustainability. The goal was to discuss ways to cut emissions and conserve energy both from its cars and in its factories. 

One challenge facing VW Group is that to meet 2015 EU emissions regulations its cars must have an average CO2 emissions of 120g/km. To do this it will have to reduce each new model generation's emissions by 10% to 15%. VW Group also plans to make its automotive production use 25% less energy by 2018. To acheive this second goal, VW Group is creating separate energy goals for each of its 94 worldwide production sites.

“We are using the opportunity offered by the conference to firm up the Group’s plans so that we can achieve our ambitious environmental targets," said Head of Environmental Affairs at VW Group Günter Damme.

Some examples of what VW Group is already doing to conserve energy include the hydroelectric power station in Polkowice, Poland, that supplies the plant with power. The Palmela factory in Portugal converts waste heat into energy for the spray booths instead of venting it into the air.