Environmental management
in the Group

The Group has set itself the target of becoming the most sustainable automobile company in the world by 2018. The Group’s environmental strategy is the framework through which the Company will become a leader in ecological terms.

By 2018, we aim to reduce energy and water consumption, emissions and waste in relation to vehicles at all of our sites by 25% compared with 2010. The charts below illustrate our progress in fiscal year 2013. The collection of key environmentally relevant consumption and emissions data on the basis of VW standard 98,000, which is applicable throughout the Group, is subject to a continual improvement process. The information that must be calculated using special algorithms is particularly affected by these optimization measures. Additionally, the integration of new Group brands and locations requires adjustments in the time series that have already been reported. The improved and updated environmental data collection process aims to increase the degree of accuracy and consistency of the information gathered.

Alongside efficient and resource-friendly production as well as the design of intelligent mobility concepts for the future the development of environmentally friendly vehicles is also one of our key action areas: we aim to reduce the CO2 emissions of our European new vehicle fleet to 95 g/km by 2020. In addition, every new model generation is designed to be 10% to 15% more efficient than its immediate predecessor.

In order to successfully implement our environmental strategy, we must model all environmentally relevant aspects in our organizational and decision-making processes, both in product development and production at all locations. This is why we have a holistic environmental management program, which has already been established in the Group for many years. The main pillars of this are the Group’s globally applicable environmental principles for products and production and the environmental goals of the Technical Development function. Since 2010, these efforts have been supported by a Group-wide energy management system. Teaching our employees about ecological issues is also an important factor in reaching our goals. For this reason, we employ environmental protection experts and environmental officers around the world, who help to build a broad foundation for environmental protection within the Group.

Since 1995, Volkswagen’s German locations have voluntarily participated in the EU’s Eco-Management and Audit Scheme as well as worldwide in the environmental certification process under international standard ISO 14001. Since 1996, the environmental management system used by Volkswagen’s Technical Development function has been certified in accordance with ISO 14001 and, since 2009, additionally in accordance with ISO/TR 14062. By means of recertifications and external validations, we also confirmed our role as a trailblazer in the reporting period.

Our Group environmental strategy takes a holistic approach that takes into account the lifecycles of our products. To do this, we chose a modular structure whereby the modules are oriented on business areas along the entire value chain. Thus we not only address environmental issues relating to production and the products themselves, but also in logistics or recycling, for example. We defined a fixed committee and reporting structure to manage these issues. The responsible parties are globally networked, enabling the systematic exchange of examples of best practice. In fiscal year 2013, at a global Group strategy workshop, we put together an ambitious package of measures together with all of the business areas and established the responsibilities and reporting structures.

A summary of our ecological activities and a supplementary overview of our key environmental indicators can be found at www.volkswagenag.com/sustainability.

ENERGY CONSUMPTION*
in kilowatt hours per vehicle
CO2 EMISSIONS*
in kilograms per vehicle
VOC EMISSIONS (VOLATILE ORGANIC COMPOUNDS)*
in kilograms per vehicle
DISPOSABLE WASTE*
in kilograms per vehicle
FRESH WATER CONSUMPTION*
in cubic meters per vehicle

* Production of passenger cars and light commercial vehicles. Prior-year figures adjusted.