Social Performance of BMW AG - Essay Example

?Communications in Business - Social Performance of BMW AG Table of Contents Corporate Environmental Obligation: An Examination of the Performance ofBMW AG 3 The Case against BMW AG 4 The Case for BMW AG 6 Conclusion 8 References 9 11 Corporate Environmental Obligation: An Examination of the Performance of BMW AG The growing concern of the common people is forcing companies such as BMW AG to focus on their corporate social responsibilities with greater significance. It is due to the fact that most of the environmental hazards are recorded to be caused because of the increasing level of technological interventions in the human life. With this concern, over the years, in its performance BMW AG has been recorded to provide significant consideration to its environmental obligations. It is in this context that the company has been recorded to be the winner of Sustainability Index Leader for consecutive 7 years (Jackson 2011). However, there are several cases which reveal facts against the operations of the company. With this concern the paper shall intend to critically analyse the performances of BMW AG in the international platform and analyse its efficiency in performing its corporate social responsibility. In this regard, both the positive and negative issues will be discussed with briefings based on the social impacts and its effect on the company’s stakeholders. The Case against BMW AG One of the CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) goals which have been determined by BMW AG to enhance its performance and sustainable growth is focused on the minimisation of the impact automobile creates on the environment. In this regard, the company enforces few technological transformations which are expected to reduce emissions and at the same time minimise the need of natural resources (BMW Group 2009). With this concern the company implies the concept of environmental management system in its operations. Adhering to its objective and the environment management approach the company concentrates on recycling the resources, such as unused cars, engines and other required materials to produce new cars. It also focuses on the utilisation of natural fibres in the door panels and sound-proofing (BMW Group 2009). However, the utilisation of natural fibres in the automotive designing can cause few disadvantages. For instance, due to the employment of natural fibres in the automobile designing, providing a perfect shape to the body of the products becomes tough. This in turn gives rise to the operational cost of the organisation. Moreover, after the recycling of natural fibres it becomes weak. Natural fibres also absorb moisture from the climate and causes swelling which in turn hamper the longevity of the automobile. Other disadvantages of using natural fibres are lower durability and quite weaker fire resistance (Rijswijk, Brouwer and Beukers 2001). Therefore, it can be stated that utilisation of natural fibres reduces the negative impact on environment which could have taken place directly due to the usage of other fibres. But on the contrary it causes deficiency in the performance of the vehicles hampering the interests of the consumers. It lacks in safety precautions, durability and reliability which can directly affect the company’s sustainable growth creating a negative impact on the society and the stakeholders on the whole. In its sustainability operations, the company is also recorded to implement hybrid technology in its production system with PSA Peugeot Citroen as a joint venture. The objective of the company in this regard is to minimise the fuel consumption and emissions with the purpose to reduce the amount of negative impact that widely used automobile technologies have on the environment (PR Newswire 2011). But the hybridisation of automobile technologies also has their inevitable disadvantages. To be mentioned in this context, hybrid technology can certainly be quite costly with limited affordability in the current market situation. According to evidences from automobile engineers it is also revealed that hybrid technologies are comparatively less reliable in terms of power. Moreover, the battery back up and the life of batteries have also raised a question in hybrid cars. As the utilisation of hybrid technologies make the vehicles lighter by reducing the overall weight, safety of the users also become questionable which is a major fault of the technology (All Hybrid Cars). This certain technological strategy also hampers the interests of stakeholders and the community as well. Even the operations of the company assigned to recycle the raw materials to be used in the production, such as steel, aluminium, plastics and other materials is also recorded to emit harmful gases in the earth’s atmosphere. However, the amount of emission is much lesser from that of the utilisation of virgin raw materials (Kumar and Southerland 2008). In a nutshell, it can be stated that despite the fact that BMW AG’s technological reformations have a great significance in rewarding the automobile industry a sustainable outlook, but on the contrary it is most likely to hamper the interests of the society and its stakeholders’ interests at large. It is in this context that the company also has many positive outcomes to favour the environmental progress which will be analysed in the further discussion to obtain a comprehensive understanding of the efficiency of the company in addressing the overall needs and demands of the stakeholders, community/society, and environment. The Case for BMW AG The BMW Group has been devoted to implement various activities concerning conservation of natural resources. Through these activities the company has taken a step towards environmental protection. BMW continuously evaluate the processes regarding environment and developed strategies and measures to minimise the consumption of resources as well as environmental impact. One of the top priorities of BMW for environmental protection is to reduce energy consumption and use alternative energy. In order to meet those priorities BMW introduced an ‘environmental management system’. The objective of the system is to reduce energy and water consumption, reduce the emission of Carbon Di-Oxide as well as waste and wastewater per vehicle (BMW Group). BMW acknowledges its responsibility towards the preservation of natural resources, so the company is devoted towards developing modern technology to minimise exhaust emissions, noise emission and also fuel consumption. BMW supports their customers by providing information regarding the use and maintenance of vehicle (BMW (UK) 2005). BMW Group optimises its product design and model to ensure that the vehicle components can be recycled as much as possible. This recycling strategy decreases the general consumption of energy and natural resources in producing vehicle. The RDC (Recycling and Dismantling centre) of BMW Group provides vital information about dismantling and drainage techniques and develops the concept of recycling for future vehicle. BMW Group makes use of natural products for technical use, for example natural fibres instead of synthetic fibre and the natural fibres are light in weight but strong. BMW Group seeks to achieve a target of 95% recovery by the year 2015 (BMW AG 2009). In order to reduce the emission of Carbon Di-Oxide BMW Group is developing continuously clean energy technologies which focus towards generating renewable energy. In the year 2006, BMW had launched BMW Hydrogen 7. This technology helps to run the vehicle either on hydrogen or on gasoline. The hydrogen technology radically reduces the emission of Carbon Di–Oxide. Unlike other energy sources such as fuel, petrol or gas, hydrogen is easily available in large amount in the environment. Hydrogen can be produced from water, wind, sun or hydropower and the hydrogen car emits nothing but vapour. Through innovating hydrogen technology BMW has gained exceptional reputation for minimising fuel consumption and emission of Carbon–Di–Oxide (PR Newswire Association 2011). BMW has innovated radiant gas heating system which reduces the Carbon–Di-Oxide emissions and also heating costs. This system produces only 350 tonnes of CO2 by saving almost 950 tonnes of CO2 (BMW (UK) 2005). In order to reduce energy consumption BMW has developed various technologies to minimise the amount of electricity consumed by vehicle. For example, BMW Group had made MINI E in the year 2008 which minimises the energy consumption and emission (China Daily 2010). The break energy regeneration system developed by BMW can reduce the amount of power which the battery takes from engine and thus minimises the consumption of fuel energy. The long term goal of BMW is to use added energy from renewable sources to meet the energy requirement. BMW Group is evaluating additional technologies such as geothermal energy, solar energy and heat pump to protect the natural resources (BMW Group). From the year 1998 to 2003, the BMW Group’s vehicles energy consumption has been reduced by 10%. Their waste water is reduced by 25 % and the emission of Carbon Di-Oxide is reduced by 14% in that period. Due to the use of reprocessing related measures for vehicles developed in BMW, industrial water related requirement was also reduced from an amount of 1.23 cubic meters to an amount of 0.92 cubic meters per vehicle which is commendable in the automotive industry (BMW Group 2004). Conclusion It is indisputable in the present context that BMW AG has developed an effective and impressive picture of sustainable strategies to prevent emissions and other environmental hazards in its operations. It has provided great consideration to the water and air pollutions. In order to eradicate these consequences the production system of the company avoids using harmful and unrenewable materials to the highest possible extent. It also focuses on the utilisation of renewable and recycled materials for its automobile designs. However, these strategies are revealed to have a certain amount of negative impact on the society and the stakeholders of the company. For instance, the technologies and strategies used in favour of environment raises the limitations in terms of durability and reliability of the vehicles. It also raises the constraints from the safety aspect. Therefore, it can be stated that BMW AG should also focus on the cons of the environment friendly technologies used in its operations. This shall reward it a more efficient and sustainable growth in its future prospects. Conclusively, the company should be more concentrated on the interests of its stakeholders and the society while implementing sustainable technologies in a comprehensive manner. References All Hybrid Cars. 2011. Hybrid Car Pro and Cons. 2011. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.allhybridcars.com/hybrid-cars-pro-and-cons.html BMW Group. Power from Your Brake Pedal. 2011. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.bmw.com/com/en/insights/technology/efficient_dynamics/phase_2/technologies/brake_energy_regeneration.html BMW Group. Group-Wide Environmental Protection – An Impulse As Natural As Growing Towards The Sun. 2011. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.bmwgroup.com/e/0_0_www_bmwgroup_com/verantwortung/publikationen/sustainable_value_report_2008/_pdf/SVR_2008_engl_Kapitel_4.pdf BMW Group. 2004. Reaching Around the World – The Development and Production Network of the BMW Group. 2011. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.bmwgroup.com/bmwgroup_prod/e/0_0_www_bmwgroup_com/unternehmen/publikationen/aktuelles_lexikon/_pdf/7produktion.pdf BMW (UK). 2005. UK Environmental Report. 2011. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.bmweducation.co.uk/downloads/online-resources/uk-environmental-report2005.pdf BMW AG. 2009. Vehicle Recycling. Focusing on Sustainability. 2011. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.bmw.com/com/en/owners/service/_shared/pdf/2009_recycling.pdf BMW Group. 2011. Environmental Protection. 2009 [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://bmwgroup.com/bmwgroup_prod/e/nav/index.html?http://bmwgroup.com/bmwgroup_prod/e/0_0_www_bmwgroup_com/verantwortung/umweltschutz/ueberblick.html BMW Group. 2011. Vehicle Recycling. 2009. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.bmw.com/com/en/owners/service/_shared/pdf/2009_recycling.pdf China Daily. 2010. Environment & Society Top Priorities For BMW. 2011. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/cndy/2010-04/24/content_9770012.htm Jackson, Ross. 2011. BMW Showcases 1-Series M Coupe at Qatar MotoGP, 2011 [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_no=423094&version=1&template_id=36&parent_id=16 Kumar, Vishesh and John. W. Southerland. 2011. Sustainability of the Automotive Recycling Infrastructure: Review of Current Research and Identification of Future Challenges. 2008. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.me.mtu.edu/~jwsuther/Publications/4_Sustainability%20of%20the%20automotive%20recycling.pdf PR Newswire. 2011. BMW Group and PSA Peugeot Citroen to Invest 100 Million EUR in Joint Venture on Hybrid Technologies. 2011. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/video-and-audio-from-bmw-ag-available-on-thenewsmarketcom-bmw-group-and-psa-peugeot-citroen-to-invest-100-million-eur-in-joint-venture-on-hybrid-technologies-117099868.html PR Newswire Association. 2011. BMW Introduces World's First Hydrogen-Drive Luxury Performance Car -- The BMW Hydrogen 7. 2011. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/bmw-introduces-worlds-first-hydrogen-drive-luxury-performance-car----the-bmw-hydrogen-7-56024817.html Rijswijk, K. V., Brouwer, W. D., and A. Beukers. 2011. Natural Fibre Composites in the Development of Rural Societies 2001. [cited 1 April 2011]. Available from http://www.fao.org/es/esc/common/ecg/554/en/Natural_Fibre_Composites_vF.pdf Read More