By 2018, we also intend to be the number one in the automotive industry in ecological terms. To reach this goal, we must first make production in our plants around the world more environmentally friendly. We aim to reduce energy and water consumption, emissions and waste at all of the Group’s sites by 25% compared with 2010. We made further progress in fiscal year 2012; the charts in chapter Efficient production provide an overview. Additional key environmental indicators can be found in the Volkswagen Group’s sustainability report. Second, we intend to make our products more environmentally friendly. Thus, we plan to reduce the CO2 emissions of the European new vehicle fleet by 30% compared with 2006 by 2015. Every new model generation is designed to be 10% to 15% more efficient than its immediate predecessor. Our Group environmental policy and Group-wide environmental management are the foundation for reaching these goals.

Environmental management ensures that the ecological aspects of sustainability in product development and in production are taken into account at all locations. The main pillars are the Group’s globally applicable environmental principles for products and production. Since 2010, these efforts have been supported by a Group-wide energy management system.

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 EN ISO 14001. Since 1996, this standard has also applied to the environmental management system used by Volkswagen’s Technical Development function, which has additionally been certified in accordance with DIN ISO/TR 14062 since 2009. By means of recertifications and external validations, we also confirmed our role as a trailblazer in the reporting period.

We specifically train environmental protection experts at many of our locations in order to implement environmental aspects across the Group. These experts support the environmental officers on the ground and help to build a broad foundation for environmental protection. The environmental officers from the European locations have been regularly sharing their experiences since 1976. They discuss current topics at environmental conferences that take place at regional and Group levels, present examples of best practice and initiate concrete measures and thus synchronize their work with Volkswagen’s environmental policies. In the reporting period, the 5th Group environmental conference was held in Wolfsburg, where over 400 experts from the locations met and discussed implementation strategies, measures and projects. A summary presentation is available at http://www.volkswagenag.com/sustainability.

SUSTAINABILITY IN THE VOLKSWAGEN GROUP
www.volkswagenag.com/sustainability

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