On Saturday, March 26, at 8:30 pm, AB Volvo will turn off the lights for an hour to support Earth Hour, the World Wild Fund for Nature’s request to turn off the lights as a global statement of concern over climate change. We encourage all Group companies to follow this initiative.
The Earth Hour action is simply to turn off the lights for one hour. The Earth Hour is a global initiative by WWF, and last year the initiative reached more than one billion people. At the Environmental Council meeting in January 2011 all BA/BU agreed that the Volvo Group will participate in the Earth Hour to the best extent possible, taking necessary safety precautions, with all its operations and facilities and encouraging employees to join privately.
As an employee, we ask you to turn off lamps, computers and other unnecessary lighting when you finish work, just as usual. And if you want, turn off your lights at home for an hour as well.
We sympathize with the WWF’s initiative, which we see as a powerful symbolic action. It’s also entirely in line with the company’s existing environmental efforts,” says Jan-Eric Sundgren, responsible for environmental and social responsibility issues in Volvo’s group management. “During 2010 Volvo has joined the WWF Climate Savers programme and we have done a commitment to WWF to reduce CO2-emissions both from our products and from our production. We see WWF as an important partner in our efforts to improve our environmental performance” says Jan-Eric.
The Volvo Group is highly committed to the environment, and has been conducting strong environmental initiatives throughout its organization for many years. The company has substantially reduced its energy consumption and CO2 emissions. In production, for instance, energy consumption has been cut by a total of approximately 40% between 2004 and 2008 (baseline year 2003) in relation to the Group’s net sales. In the new environmental challenge for 2010-2012 we’ll continue our efforts to improve energy efficiency with a special focus on idling losses.
Recent milestones in Volvo’s history from an environmental perspective:
• In 2007, The Volvo Group is the first vehicle manufacturer to introduce seven different demonstration trucks, all of which can be driven without any emissions of climate-impacting carbon dioxide.
• Volvo Buses initiates serial production of the Volvo 7700 Hybrid bus and double-decker Volvo B5L Hybrid in 2010. The hybrid technology reduces fuel consumption and CO2 emissions by up to 35 percent.
• The same year, Volvo Trucks becomes the first truck manufacturer in the world to use Bio-DME (dimethyl ether) as a fuel for motor vehicles. The first Volvo’s DME trucks in commercial operation are placed in service on Swedish roads.
• The Volvo Group was also the first truck manufacturer in the world to join “Climate Savers,” an initiative started by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), in November 2010.
Volvo Group in co-operation with WWF Climate Savers
Volvo Group environmental work
