Climate protection

The KION Group fully intends to minimise its contribution to global warming and strives to continuously reduce its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This is why the KION Group has committed itself as part of its climate protection action field to setting a greenhouse gas emissions reduction target by 2018, and to establish the programme required to achieve this.

CO₂ emissions can trigger adverse environmental and social impacts. Besides production related energy use these are generated predominantly during the products’ utilisation phase (see chapter Products and services), by service vehicles as well as by employee business trips. In addition, greenhouse gas emissions are produced in the upstream chain, such as during the production of materials and component products. Logistics and transportation activities also generate greenhouse gas emissions and lead to road-traffic growth.

To counter these effects, in the reporting year KION held targeted climate management workshops. Among other things, they examined the extent to which the KION Group can set itself a science-based climate target in line with the outcomes of the Paris Agreement and which helps limit global warming to below 2°C. A target was formulated as an ambition. Furthermore, the KION Group analysed its corporate carbon footprint in 2017; Scopes 1 and 2 were examined in full, whereas Scope 3 was only examined for relevance to the topic of products.

When identifying suitable measures to reduce greenhouse gases, the KION Group – just like almost every other industrial company – faces the challenge of technical restrictions. Among them, the coke required for the smelting process to produce counterweights cannot simply be reduced.

This is why all measures follow this priority ranking: the Company will constantly strive to achieve a reduction in its CO₂ emissions. If it cannot go any further, it will endeavour to substitute fuels with lower-emission fuels. And once this measure does not deliver further reductions either, it will then counter the impact of its CO₂ emissions through offsetting measures.

When procuring company vehicles, their CO₂ emissions are a criterion. The regular sharing of experiences in the HSE network of experts, as well as measures to raise employee awareness such as the start of the Group-wide Climate Championship in 2018, also help the KION Group make further progress in the area of climate protection.

Energy use

Reducing the amount of energy it uses is the KION Group’s key lever in minimising its impact on climate change – and also one of the key environmental cost factors. The smelting process in the foundries and the use of service vehicles at sales and service units are particularly energy intensive.

In 2017 the KION Group used 2,378 terajoules of energy (> Table 11), whereby direct energy consumption accounted for 1,595 terajoules, and 742 terajoules were accounted for by transportation. 783 terajoules of energy were used indirectly Group-wide in 2017, i.e. primarily through purchased electricity.

A range of measures were also rolled out across the KION Group in 2017 to further reduce its energy consumption. Currently, 49 reporting entities follow specific energy-reduction targets, comprising 19 plants as well as 30 sales and service locations. Besides the use of energy-saving lighting and sensors, the use of photovoltaic systems is also being assessed. An initial system is currently under construction at one production plant and will enter into operation in 2018.

24 units currently use renewable forms of energy, and 45 units have implemented green IT measures to reduce their energy consumption. 50 reporting entities are working on specific measures to improve their transportation activities, including the optimisation of route planning and the use of GPS to avoid multiple trips.

The KION Group intends to establish Group-wide minimum energy standards for all units. To achieve this objective it is expanding the scope of its HSE minimum standard in 2018 and also supplementing its HSE manual with corresponding organisational principles, documents and forms. With this in mind, the KION Group intends to roll out an ISO 50001-compliant energy management system at its 25 reporting entities with the greatest energy use. Last but not least, it will give greater importance to climate protection aspects – which also means reducing its energy consumption – within the framework of the KION HSE audit process.

Emissions

The KION Group generates GHG emissions almost exclusively through its use of energy (> Table 12). It has presented these emissions in accordance with the internationally recognised rules of the Greenhouse Gas Protocol. Its consumption data are converted using emissions factors taken from the DEFRA database (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, UK, as at 2015). Around 51 per cent of the KION Group’s GHG emissions are direct, with 49 per cent accounted for by indirect emissions. Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are released particularly by the Group’s paint shops.

The KION Group does not participate in emissions trading. Clear targets and comprehensive measures are intended to help further reduce the Group’s emissions. 20 of its reporting entities have set specific GHG emissions reduction targets, while 37 aim to make specific process optimisations to reduce energy and GHG emissions, and 23 already use technologies to reduce GHG emissions. Two examples: roofing the foundry’s coal / coke bunker at the Weilbach plant lowered consumption of this fuel by around 10 per cent, with a corresponding drop in CO₂ emissions. Project Sunshine at the Summerville plant in the US aims to generate around 80 per cent of the energy required for production processes through solar energy in future.

The Company’s comprehensive awareness-raising programmes on energy consumption and emissions have already reached around 31 per cent of employees, particularly those at its production plants. In the reporting year this included the training of executives on the topic of sustainability, in which over 200 executives took part.