The Bosch Group, a German global supplier of technology and services, plans to reduce carbon footprint to zero by 2020, said Dr Volkmar Denner, chairman of Robert Bosch GmbH, at the company’s annual press conference.

The company has posted record sales revenue of 78.5 billion euros ($88 billion) for 2018, as against 76.8 billion euros in 2017, marking an increase of 2.2 per cent.

 Earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) from operations reached 5.5 billion euros. In spite of heavy upfront investments in areas such as the electrification and automation of mobility, EBIT margin from operations improved again in 2018, rising from 6.8 percent in 2017 to 7.0 percent. Bosch increased its expenditure on research and development to 7.3 billion euros, or 9.3 percent of sales revenue. Capital expenditure rose by 14 percent to 4.9 billion euros, or 6.3 percent of sales revenue. Bosch created almost 8,000 new jobs worldwide in 2018, more than half of them in research and development.

For the current year, Bosch expects economic developments to be subdued. The company forecasts that the global economy will grow by just 2.3 percent. Trade disputes, the high levels of debt in European countries, and the decrease in automotive production are among the factors putting a strain on the global economy. Despite the difficult environment in industries and regions that are important for Bosch, the company expects its sales in 2019 to slightly exceed their 2018 levels. The first three months of the year saw sales nearly on a par with the previous year. Regardless of this short-term outlook, the Bosch Group is intensifying its efforts to combat climate change and improve air quality.

“Climate change is not science fiction; it’s really happening. If we are to take the Paris Agreement seriously, then climate action needs to be seen not just as a long-term aspiration. It needs to happen here and now,” said Dr Volkmar Denner, chairman of the board of management of Robert Bosch GmbH, at the company’s annual press conference.

“We also take people’s concerns about clean air quality in cities very seriously. As an innovation leader, we want to deliver technological solutions to ecological problems. Driving bans, diesel protests, yellow vests, and Friday climate strikes – all this shows that companies need to take climate action and offer new solutions for urban air quality, not least to stabilize the social climate.”

Bosch to be first carbon-neutral industrial enterprise from 2020

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), manufacturing is responsible for almost one-third of global carbon dioxide emissions. This is reason enough for Bosch to intensify its already successful efforts to reduce its CO2 output.

“We will be the first major industrial enterprise to achieve the ambitious goal of carbon neutrality in a little over a year. From 2020, Bosch will have a net-zero carbon footprint,” Denner announced. “All 400 Bosch locations across the globe will be carbon neutral from 2020.”

To achieve this, the company will be using four major levers. Bosch will increase energy efficiency, increase the proportion of renewables in its energy supply, buy in more green power, and offset unavoidable carbon emissions. This will avoid 3.3 million tons of CO2 emissions by 2020.

Better air quality: near-zero pollution

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), around 90 percent of the world’s population breathe toxic air. “We want to reduce air pollution from traffic to virtually zero. To do this, we’re looking beyond the car’s hood,” Denner said.

The company’s project to reduce the concentration of air pollutants to near-zero levels is built on three pillars: Bosch is developing low-pollutant powertrain technologies, working with municipal governments on projects to maintain steady traffic flows, and is running a company mobility management system at its own locations.

Optimizing internal-combustion engines – using AI

The company forecasts that roughly 75 percent of all new cars and light commercial vehicles will still be powered by an internal-combustion engine in 2030. In view of this, Bosch is continuing to invest considerable sums in optimizing gasoline and diesel engines. The company is also using artificial intelligence to further develop internal-combustion engines.

As an example, Bosch is using AI to predictively control exhaust-gas treatment according to patterns drawn from individuals’ driving behaviour, as this can further reduce vehicles’ emissions. Some 3,500 associates in the company’s exhaust-gas treatment and exhaust sensors units generated sales of 2.3 billion euros in 2018. This figure is set to reach 3 billion euros by 2025.

Electromobility: 14 million vehicles by end of 2022

Bosch also expects electric vehicles to play a major part in improving air quality in cities. In the emerging mass market for electromobility, Bosch is striving to become market leader. By 2025, the company aims to generate 5 billion euros in sales with electromobility, ten times the figure for 2018.

“In the growing competition for value creation in the powertrain technology domain, we see good opportunities ahead. Our systems know-how, our broad product portfolio, and economies of scale in manufacturing make us the partner of choice for vehicle manufacturers and mobility providers worldwide,” Denner said.

Automated driving: lower consumption and emissions

Automated driving will also play a part in improving air quality. According to the re-search firm KE Consult, automated driving can reduce fuel consumption by over 30 per-cent, and by 15 percent on German freeways. More than 5,000 Bosch engineers are now working on automated driving, almost twice as many as two years ago.

As Denner noted: “By 2022, we plan to have invested around 4 billion euros in automation and thus in sustainable mobility.”

Driver assistance systems are contributing to growth on the path to automated driving. From current levels of around 2 billion euros, revenue is expected to increase by almost 15 percent this year. Sales of radar sensors are expected to grow by 20 percent, and sales of video sensors by 30 percent. “Automated driving is not just an area of future promise, it’s already a growth area for us today,” Denner said. – TradeArabia News Service