Pressure on car manufacturers as Germans confirm CO2 choice

Brussels, 9 September 2007:— VDA President (German Automotive Industry Association), Matthias Wissmann has confirmed today with an official press release the choice of environmentally friendly CO2 car air conditioning. All eyes are now on other manufacturers worldwide to follow suit.

"We welcome this courageous decision by German car makers to lead the world with sustainable air conditioning”, says Wolfgang Lohbeck, Greenpeace’s Head of Technical Innovations and Projects, and supporter of the Alliance for CO2 Solutions.

“With this joint step the German car manufacturers are taking the lead in climate friendly refrigerants and putting action their strategy for sustainable mobility”. Wissmann states in the VDA Press release. This decision effectively puts an end in Germany to long discussions about which systems to choose in order to comply with an EU Directive banning high global warming refrigerant from 2011.

Other car manufacturers from Europe, Asia and America are now faced with increasing pressure to make a sustainable choice. “New chemical blends that were proposed recently are no longer an option, as the VDA members have stated. The other chemical option discussed in the past was HFC-152a. However, this substance poses a number of risks: it is flammable, it can decompose into toxic substances, it will be more complicated technically and costly than current technology, in addition to being over 100 times worse for global warming than CO2”, Lohbeck concludes.

The Alliance for CO2 Solutions is a grouping of organisations that support the use of CO2 Technology in car air conditioning. Its supporters include Greenpeace, Deutsche Umwelthilfe, Ixetic, Konvekta, SINTEF and Shecco.

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