Eco Warriors

Volvo reducing lifecycle carbon footprint per car by 40% by 2040, becoming carbon neutral

Eileen Falkenberg-Hull
Oct 30, 2019, 9:37 am

Volvo is setting ambitious goals for becoming eco friendly throughout its supply chain.

Photo courtesy of Volvo Car USA

Volvo wants to become a carbon neutral company by 2040. To get to that milestone, the automaker has announced plans to reduce its lifecycle carbon footprint per car by 40 percent by 2025. They also want their manufacturing network to be carbon neutral by 2025.

The company isn't just rolling out a fleet of electric vehicles and calling it a day. They are tackling the issue throughout their business network from the supply chain to materials reuse to vehicle electrification.

"We are transforming our company through concrete actions, not symbolic pledges," said Håkan Samuelsson, chief executive. "So at Volvo Cars we will address what we control, which is both our operations and the tailpipe emissions of our cars. And we will address what we can influence, by calling on our suppliers and the energy sector to join us in aiming for a climate neutral future."

Volvo manufacturing Volvo will be working with its suppliers to help them clean up their operations in order to achieve their goal.Photo courtesy of Volvo Car USA

The biggest piece of the puzzle includes the goal of generating 50 percent of global sales from fully electric cars by 2025. This would reduce tailpipe emissions by half. This will, of course, depend on the market's demand for these sorts of vehicles.

Volvo is also aiming to reduce the CO2 emissions of its global supply chain by 2025 and will equip each new Volvo car with 25 percent recycled plastics by the same year. An additional 25 percent reduction in carbon emissions will be possible by modifying operations practices.

Volvo has already announced plans to phase out the internal combustion engine in the coming years. They recently debuted their first electric vehicle, the XC40 Recharge.

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Such a Tease

Toyota hints on social media about what to expect from the new EV it's debuting next week

Toyota's ready to make a big announcement.

Photo courtesy of Toyota Motor Corporation2

Auto Shanghai has another surprise in store. Toyota will debut an electrified vehicle next week and ahead of that moment, the company has leaked teaser photos and video featuring the model on its social media channels.

One of the posts, available on Twitter and Instagram, showcases the vehicle and a series of conceptual, perhaps inspirational, related items. A light shines as a reflection in an eye. A design on paper leads to a math equation. A laser, perhaps a plasma cutter, is focused on an object. Watch the see the rest.


It passes by quickly, but in there is the shape of a crossover. We've captured the moment in a still photo below so you can take a longer look. From the body design quickly shown here, the SUV is shaped more like the Toyota Venza than the Toyota RAV4. The key here is the rear side window, which is more triangular, like the Venza, than the squared-off RAV4''s.

202 The shape of the vehicle is similar to the Toyota Venza.Photo courtesy of Toyota Motor Corporation

2022 Toyota Venza EV

The face of the vehicle, shown in another social media post (this time on Instagram) and at the top of this article, shows a pared back vehicle face. The height of the vehicle confirms that it's in fact a crossover body style.

We do know that Subaru and Toyota have been working on an electric SUV for a while. While Subaru is likely calling the vehicle "Evoltis" there's some indication that Toyota may be reviving the "Celica" name for the EV. Batteries, after all, are made up of cells.

As of right now, we have to take the wait-and-see approach. One thing's for sure. We'll know more next week.

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In-Car Tech

Lexus Teammate advanced driver assist tech debuting on 2022 LS 500h

New driver assist technology is coming to the Lexus lineup later this year.

Photo courtesy of Lexus

New Lexus Teammate driver assistance technology will debut on the 2022 Lexus LS 500h later this year. Its availability is constrained to all-wheel drive models.

The technology was developed based on the Mobility Teammate Concept. This automated driving concept is unique to Toyota sough to enhance communication between drivers and cars, "enabling them to reach out to each other for mutual assistance". The concept sees cars and humans interacting and partnering rather than having automation take over for drivers. This approach allows drivers to enjoy the experience of driving but allowing the vehicle to take over some functions of driver's duties at times. In this way, the tech works as both guardian and chauffeur.

2022 Lexus The company's flagship sedan will get the technology first.Photo courtesy of Lexus

2022 Lexus LS 500h

On the 2022 Lexus 500h, Lexus Teammate will offer two functions: Advanced Drive and Advanced Park.

Advanced Drive is design to "accurately detect driving conditions to plan and execute acceleration, braking, and steering commands to maintain the vehicle within the lane, follow other vehicles, change lanes, navigate certain interchanges and traffic jams and overtake slower vehicles." It's a Level 2 functionality that "allows for driving on limited-access highways with partial hands-free, eyes-on-the-road operation".

This description makes it sound a lot like the suite of lane keeping, lane centering, and adaptive cruise control technology that Hyundai offers rather than true Level 3 technology that General Motors's Super Cruise delivers.

Lexus will show operation of the technology on a screen with information displayed like this.Photo courtesy of Lexus

Advanced Park operates similar to how the Genesis GV80's hands-free parking assist technology works. The Lexus tech automatically controls steering, acceleration, braking, and gear changes with parallel parking or backing into a parking space. It uses a combination of 360-degree sensing technologies and a bird's eye view display to perform the task while allowing the driver to monitor progress.

"We are very proud of Lexus Teammate, which is the culmination of five years of close collaboration between our technical centers in Japan and the US. We conducted simultaneous development and rigorous testing in both markets with the goal of achieving industry-leading advanced driver assistance functionality," says Derek Caveney, executive engineer at Toyota Motor North America's Integrated Vehicle Systems team.

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