Sustainability at the core of the corporate strategy.

The BMW Group remains committed to its ambitious sustainability goals and is consistently driving the company’s transformation to achieve climate neutrality by 2050. Recycling raw materials in a circular economy is intended to achieve the best possible resource efficiency.

Munich. The BMW Group continues to adhere to its ambitious sustainability targets and will reduce its CO₂ emissions by 40 percent per vehicle by 2030 across the entire value chain, compared to 2019 values.

“We are consistently driving the issue of sustainability with our innovations,” says Thomas Becker, Head of Sustainability and Mobility at the BMW Group. “The current raw materials debate also validates our drive towards a circular economy. We want to make the best possible use of the raw materials in our end-of-life vehicles and recycle them in producing new vehicles. We will continue to reduce CO₂ emissions and conserve natural resources through maximum energy and raw material efficiency.”

An average of almost 30 percent of BMW Group vehicles are made from recycled and reused materials today, so-called “secondary raw materials.” In the longer term, the “Secondary First” approach aims to increase this figure to 50 percent.

The BMW Group is the first German car manufacturer to join the Science Based Targets initiative’s (SBTi) “Business Ambition for 1.5°C”. This means the company’s path to climate neutrality is following a scientifically validated and transparent path that is in line with the most ambitious target of the Paris Climate Agreement. At the same time, the company is committed to the goal of complete climate neutrality across the entire value chain no later than 2050.

The 360-degree approach across the entire value chain.

The BMW Group is consistently driving forward the electrification of its entire fleet. By 2030, at least one in two cars sold by the BMW Group will be fully electric. The MINI and Rolls-Royce Motor Cars brands will offer only fully electric vehicles from the beginning of the next decade. For example, the BMW Group aims to reduce CO₂ emissions per vehicle in the use phase by 50 percent by 2030, compared to 2019 values.

“However, sustainability means much more for the BMW Group than merely building and selling electrically powered vehicles,” adds Becker. “Only a comprehensive sustainability approach from resource to recycling achieves a bottom-line reduction of CO₂emissions.” 

CO₂ savings in the supply chain are becoming enormously important as e-mobility ramps up, especially given the energy-intensive production of high-voltage batteries. Nevertheless, the BMW Group aims to buck the trend by reducing CO2 emissions in the supply chain by 20 percent by 2030, compared to 2019 values, and by as much as 80 percent in production. The BMW Group’s global production network is already carbon net-neutral, thanks to selected offsetting initiatives.

“Green steel” reduces CO₂ emissions by up to 95 percent.

When it comes to reducing CO₂ emissions in the supply chain, using electricity from renewable sources can achieve spectacular progress. The BMW Group has already entered into more than 400 contracts with its suppliers to use 100 percent green electricity, which includes aluminum suppliers as well as the producers of the battery cells. The BMW Group has been sourcing aluminum from the United Arab Emirates since February 2021, using electricity generated from solar energy. From 2024 onwards, all cast aluminum wheels for the BMW and MINI brands will be produced using only green electricity. 

Carbon dioxide emissions are also being continuously reduced in the steel supply chain. From 2025 onwards, the BMW Group will purchase CO₂ -reduced steel produced not using fossil-based raw materials such as coal but instead using natural gas or hydrogen and green electricity. Making steel in this way reduces CO2 emissions by up to 95 percent. This will reduce CO₂emissions by up to 400,000 tonnes per year.

Innovative recycling processes as the basis for an effective circular economy.

The BMW Group is also doing important groundwork around vehicle recycling on the road to a closed-loop economy. Up to 10,000 BMW, MINI, Rolls-Royce, and BMW Motorrad vehicles are recycled yearly at the BMW Group’s Recycling and Dismantling Centre (RDZ) in Unterschleißheim near Munich.

They are dismantled in a standardized process that focuses on identifying reusable components as well as materials that are suitable for recycling. BMW Group designers and development engineers use the expertise gained by the RDZ to optimize the recyclability of new models right from the start. 

The RDZ has also used innovative methods for many years to recycle high-voltage batteries from electrified vehicles. Processes have been developed with partners from industry and science that can achieve a recycling rate of more than 90 percent. 

In China, the BMW Brilliance Automotive (BBA) joint venture has now, for the first time, established a closed cycle for reusing the raw materials nickel, lithium, and cobalt from high-voltage batteries. The raw materials extracted are used to produce new battery cells for the BMW Group. The closed material cycle conserves the consumption of resources and reduces CO2 emissions by around 70 percent compared to using newly mined primary material.

Sustainable production: less CO₂ waste and water consumption.

Circular economy principles also influence production processes. The BMW Group has established closed loops for steel and aluminum between its production sites and suppliers. As a result, around 70 percent of the steel waste from the pressing plants and the aluminum residues are reused through a direct circular economy (the closed loop).

The BMW Group has reduced CO₂ emissions attributable to vehicle production by more than 70 percent since 2006. All plants in the international production network have been CO2 -neutral since 2021. Alongside this, water consumption and waste generation have also been continuously reduced. For example, only around 580 grams of residual waste were produced per vehicle manufactured in 2021 at the BMW Group’s largest European plant in Dingolfing.

Energy efficiency, resource conservation, and waste avoidance are being further improved at the BMW Group’s production sites with the transformation into a factory. The new BMW Group plant northwest of the Hungarian city of Debrecen, where our “Neue Klasse” models will be built from 2025 onwards, is a prime example of vehicle production consistently geared towards sustainability and the circular economy.