ROME – Audi’s new challenge with “Mission: Zero” is the search for carbon neutrality and sustainability in the entire life cycle of products. A goal that the house of the four rings aims to achieve in 2050 for all its activities, with a road map that already from 2026 will see the introduction on the market of new electric-only models and with the end of the production of thermal engines set by 2033.
In 2025, the brand will reduce the ecological footprint of its fleet by 30% compared to 2015 thanks to the carbon neutral conversion of all its plants, as already happened in the factories in Brussels, Belgium, and Gy? R, in Hungary. To achieve this ambitious result, Audi has started monitoring all phases of the production chain (from the origin of raw materials to production, from the phases of use to the end of life, with particular attention to the recycling or reuse of components) and the collaboration with energy producers to promote the increase in the use of renewable sources.
With the various initiatives of the “Audi CO2 Program”, the company aims to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 1.2 tons per car by 2025, a possible goal given that only last year, by acting on production, Audi avoided the emission of 335,000 tons of CO2 into the atmosphere, with a virtuous increase of 35,000 tons compared to 2019.
Thanks to the adoption of the closed cycle of aluminum, with the reuse of processing waste, in 2020, emissions of approximately 165,000 tons of CO2 were saved. Another virtuous solution comes from the use of PET, a recycled plastic polymer that can be separated from the other materials with which it is combined and then reused for the coatings and the various components of the cars, while for the “energy-consuming” lithium-ion batteries we try to use green energy as much as possible. Just to give a concrete example, in the A3, three different fabric seat covers are available, with a percentage of recycled yarn up to 89%, a percentage that will soon reach 100%.
Another fundamental aspect on the sustainability front is represented by water, one of the most precious resources on the planet for which Audi has made the rationalization of its consumption one of the pillars of the “Mission: Zero” program. The House of the Four Rings aims to minimize its water needs by implementing rainwater storage and soon extending the closed water cycle to all its plants.
Among the other measures adopted to achieve its carbon neutrality goal we also find artificial intelligence and an algorithm with which the virtuous behaviors of the various suppliers are constantly monitored and there is not even an energy storage system obtained through a “second life. ”Of the batteries that pour their charge into the network during peak phases. In short, many systems and technologies that, all together, will allow the Ingolstadt house to reach the coveted goal. (mr)
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