Daimler-Benz News from August 24, 1995

Environmental Report
from Daimler-Benz

Environmental Protection
Running Costs
Increase by 20 Percent

Ulm/Stuttgart, August 24, 1995
In the course of the past year, the Daimler-Benz Group spent just short of DM 1 billion on environmental protection. This figure includes both investments and the running costs associated with environmental protection measures. When the comparable figure of environmental protection expenditure on research and development work is also taken into account, the total expenditure on environmental protection falls just short of DM 2 billion. In particular, the running costs for environmental protection have risen by some 20 percent from DM 670 million to more than DM 860 million, revealed the Group's Chief Environmental Officer, Prof. Werner Pollmann, on the occasion of the presentation of the Group's new Environmental Report in Stuttgart on August 24, 1995. This was seen as a clear indication of the Group's increased sense of responsibility with regard to environmental protection.

Overall, the majority of the environmentally-relevant statistics show a falling trend. For example, despite considerable increases in production, process water consumption fell from 5.8 million cubic meters to 5.5 million cubic meters, whilst the quantity of wastes was reduced from 124,000 tonnes to 115,000 tonnes. Prof. Pollmann pointed out that currently, only one-third of waste is disposed of, whilst two-thirds is fed back into the production process. He then went on to cite several examples of environmental protection measures within the group. These included a new dip-coating facility for the new "Sprinter" van at the Mercedes-Benz plant in Düsseldorf, a biological sewage treatment plant in Argentina, the air and water quality monitoring system which makes use of bacteria and microscopic organisms, and a measuring system which measures ozone concentrations during flight.

According to Prof. Pollmann, environmental protection in Germany "has acquired a new quality". Recent results have made clear that: "rather than purely quantitative information, such as emission levels per cubic meter, it is the impact of environmental measures that are currently attracting attention."

Against this background, Daimler-Benz is extremely interested in helping solve the problem of defining commercially binding "environmental quality goals". Daimler-Benz supports measures which "seek to control emissions with the aim of reducing unavoidable pollutants." In Prof. Pollmann's opinion, however, the resource taxation model championed by some political groups in the discussion concerning ecological tax reform "does not yet represent a feasible approach" as far as Daimler-Benz is concerned.

Comprehensive Statement by Prof. Pollmann
Online Edition of the Environmental Report

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