Volkswagen sets course for green electricity to power all freight carried on Deutsche Bahn
Volkswagen Group Logistics is switching all Deutsche Bahn carriage of materials and vehicles within Germany to green electricity by the start of 2021. This will cut over 26,700 tonnes of CO2 emissions a year compared to the conventional electricity mix. 95 percent of all such transportation is already powered by green electricity. In addition even more freight is set to go by rail: Volkswagen aims to increase vehicle transportation by train from 53 per cent today up to 60 per cent by 2022. “With this green electricity offensive we are making an important contribution towards Group decarbonization”, says Thomas Zernechel, Head of Volkswagen Group Logistics. For this purpose, Deutsche Bahn feeds in electricity from wind farms and hydropower plants.
He continues: “No car maker in Europe transports more freight by rail using renewable electric power than Volkswagen. In addition to our electric vehicle production having a carbon-neutral footprint, this is a further element in being able, for instance, to hand vehicles from the Volkswagen ID range to customers without any CO2 baggage.”
When operations are running normally, over 190,000 freight wagons a year are in use for Volkswagen. On average 38 long-distance and 157 local trains a day deliver materials to the plants – in total around 100,000 wagons a year. Meanwhile, around 90,000 wagons take approximately 900,000 vehicles from the plants to 40 interim storage facilities, distribution centres and ports. The brands transported in this way are Volkswagen Passenger Cars, AUDI, ŠKODA, SEAT, Porsche and Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles.
“Each ton being transported by rail automatically reduces CO2 emissions by 80%. By making this switch, Volkswagen is sending out a strong signal and giving its backing to 100% green transportation with no CO2 emissions. That pleases us as DB Cargo and will please our environment even more”, says Dr Sigrid Evelyn Nikutta, DB Freight Transport Director and Chair of DB Cargo.
