NEW DELHI, October 9 : Popular luxury car and motorcycle maker of Germany – BMW (Bayerische Motoren Werke AG-German pronunciation) has taken up steps for “sustainable mobility” in this changing world by introducing electric cars and care sharing initiatives for the global consumers.
“The world is changing faster than we think so car industries are also changing these days to decarbonisation and digitalisation as the global trend is driving the future of sustainable mobility,” says Andreas Khegescheid, Head of steering government & External affairs BMW, while speaking to this reporter on the sideline of the ‘Realizing the Electric mobility vision’ at the ongoing World Sustainable Development Summit (WSDS) which concludes on Saturday. “Sustainability is no longer a password but become a global necessity”.
The four-day WSDS was organised by The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI).
The company, which have 82 car models, now have battery enabled and hybrid cars. Informing that electric mobility is not a trend that will disappear again, Andreas said it is the solution for sustainable individual mobility. Well over 2 million XEVs will reached by end of this year.
Interestingly, the German car maker has also started ‘car sharing’ initiatives through Arriva, an agency in Copenhagen by introducing more than 400 BMW cars and they are now getting 800,000 customers.
Most of the speakers during the mobility session which was chaired by Prakash, Distinguished Fellow TERI, also observed that use of electric two wheelers and three wheelers for intra-city travel sustainability improve air quality and reduce carbon emissions.
Plying of electric taxi was also advocated as there is unprecedented growth of vehicles in India in the last few years.
According to Joint Secretary Abhay Damle of Union Ministry of Road Transport & Highways, there are 190 million vehicles including 130 million two wheelers on India roads.
So we need to focus on pollution sector as urban priority as two wheelers are main polluters, Abhay said.
Meanwhile, in his special address in another session, CEO Amitabh Kant of NITI Aayog (National Institution for Transforming India) said, “whether we like it or not, 300 million people will move to cities in India in the next five decades. Therefore it is important to plan for urbanization. For this the country will be facing two big challenges – Urbanisation and water availability.”
Kant said, “We need good public transport. We need to recycle waste. We need water as 80 percent of water available goes to irrigation”.
Stating that India is committed to implementing the Sustainable Development Ggoals (SDG), creating 100 smart cities, increasing the contribution of solar energy to 75 GW and strengthening public transport by creating 15 metro systems, he said it is not the government making the commitment but each and every individual’s active participation is necessary to make it happen.
“The country would not reach its SDG unless education and health development takes place,” Kant said adding, “Restructuring our education and health sectors besides enhancing the nutritional activities will enable India in achieving SDGs.”
