In Verona, Italy, Volvo Trucks has inaugurated its first climate-neutral dealership facility. With the help of solar cells on the building’s roof, more energy will be created than is required to warm the offices and workshops.
“When we decided to build an entirely new facility, we wanted to make sure we integrated pro-environmental technologies from the ground up, and what is cleaner than solar energy?” says Marco Lazzoni, MD of Volvo Trucks, Italy.
Solar energy fashioned at the Volvo Truck Centre in Verona will be supplied to the local power grid, returning profits from the electricity that the dealership facility itself does not require. In return, the dealership will only obtain green electricity from solar, wind-power or hydropower sources. Heating of the premises will take place with fossil methane gas. However, the surplus electricity that the solar panels produce more than compensates for the carbon dioxide emissions caused by burning the methane gas.
“Here at Volvo Trucks we work intensively to ensure that ever-increasing proportions of our operations are climate-neutral. With the new facility, we’re carrying our dedication to the climate out to the dealership level,” says Lars Martensson, environment affairs manager at Volvo Trucks.
Volvo Trucks’ aim is that more dealers should pursue Verona’s example. It is not expected that all will follow the avenue of solar cells, but there are alternative ways to proceed.
Volvo Trucks has, over the years, implemented a series of actions that help decrease the environmental imprint of its operations and products. For example, the company’s biggest production facility in Ghent, Belgium became the world’s first climate-neutral vehicle factory in 2007. That same year, Volvo Trucks demonstrated 7 trucks each in operation on a different renewable fuel. These activities show that even a player in heavy industry can decrease climate impact from both its products and its facilities.
