Volkswagen Group ups the ante on renewable energy

The Volkswagen Group says it’s making good progress towards carbon neutral production by 2050.

The group aims to sell 28 million battery electric vehicles (BEVs) within eight years (by 2028) with customer deliveries of its ID.3 EV due to start around mid-2020 and the ID.4 crossover to debut at the New York Auto Show in April.

The Group has now set itself further ambitious targets for 2020 in order to expand the percentage of externally sourced energy from renewable sources at its plants.

The external power supply to Volkswagen brand’s 16 plants around the world has already been switched to 70% green electricity from renewable sources. The Group has now resolved to increase this figure to 90% inside just one year.

The power supply for the Wolfsburg production operation is currently being switched by 2022 to highly efficient combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) plants. In cogeneration mode the CO2 emissions from generating electricity and heat will go down as a result by 60% or around 1.5 million tonnes a year. That is equivalent to the emissions of more than 870,000 cars.

Volkswagen says by using such power plants it is making a long-term contribution to the stability of the national grid and power system in Germany.