Anyone who drives knows about AMAG. The car company has been operating since 1945 and sells Switzerland’s best-known and most popular car brands. Mobility is AMAG’s core business and change in mobility is an ongoing issue. The company is currently setting an example in the field of electromobility by promoting the expansion of its charging infrastructure. The company is also investing in solar systems to meet its own electricity needs and also to produce energy for electric vehicles together with itself and its partners.
«AMAG presented its sustainability and climate strategy in summer 2021. As a company by 2025, we want to be climate neutral and reach net zero by 2040,” said Dino Graf, Head of Communications, Group. we organized a climate week where employees can contribute with ideas about what AMAG can do better and where employees can contribute themselves, both at work and in their private lives,” says Graf.
Company challenge as a motivator
In light of this, participation in the Swiss Climate Challenge was a logical step. 450 AMAG employees tracked their mobility for six weeks from May to mid-June. It’s easy with Swisscom’s Swiss Climate Challenge app: motion data is recorded in the background, allowing conclusions to be drawn about the means of transport used by speed, stops and route. From here, the personal climate footprint is calculated.
“Participating companies carry out the company challenge as part of their internal communication on climate protection. It’s a fun incentive for them, which is welcome in the context of a serious issue,” explains Res Witschi, Swisscom Delegate for Sustainable Digitization. He has been running the Swiss Climate Challenge for some time and knows that the implementation has had an impact. We’ve seen it go down.”
The challenge has been successfully overcome
Witschi’s statement was confirmed by the AMAG result: 450 participants’ CO₂ emissions fell by 20 percent overall during the competition. It went from an average of 105 grams per kilometer to 75 grams. For comparison: All 1,500 users of the Swiss Climate Challenge app have daily CO₂ emissions of 135 grams per kilometer traveled.
AMAG spokesman Dino Graf is also pleased: “This shows that our employees are open to the issue. At first, we were skeptical whether the ‘oil heads’ in the automotive industry would accept this challenge. Today we know that AMAG employees take these issues very seriously and are willing to change.»
More trips with electric cars
The goals of the corporate challenge at AMAG included reducing daily CO₂ emissions, walking or biking distances, and paying attention to the mobility mix. It’s interesting how car professionals act. Of course, motor vehicles play an important role. 32,406 trips were recorded in six weeks. Of these, 16,069 were cars with internal combustion engines. Even more, 16,337 trips in alternatively driven vehicles.
The high rate of electric cars corresponds to the trend in new registrations: their rate has been rising steadily for years and is now over 52 percent. Graf underlines that electric cars are also very popular in the fleet of AMAG employees.
Mobility mix was also achieved: in the six-week company struggle, the car dominated only in terms of distances traveled. With more than 58,000 metrics, public transport, cycling and walking top the list for 450 participants.
Permanent effect?
Overall, the challenge was very well received by AMAG staff. The majority stated that they knew their personal CO₂ footprints better and adjusted their mobility behavior. Using the Swiss Climate Challenge app motivated more than half of the 450 participants to make their mobility more climate friendly. A good portion will continue to use the program. According to Graf, it is not yet clear how this will affect employee mobility.
Res Witschi of Swisscom believes in a lasting effect: “We also observe that a large proportion of participants follow themselves for some time after the struggle and deal with their footprints. When you engage objectively with your climate behavior over a period of time, the experiences you acquire will also influence future behavior.”
very easy to join
If you want to know how your own mobility affects the climate, you can download the Swiss Climate Challenge App from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store. The app measures movement and uses it to calculate transport and associated CO₂ emissions and their impact on climate change.
“Reducing the climate footprint is one of the biggest challenges available,” says Res Witschi. “The Swiss Climate Challenge was launched as part of Swisscom’s initiative to empower customers to lead a climate-friendly lifestyle with digital offerings.”
Save 1 million tons of CO₂
The app wants to create incentives for private individuals and companies to motivate themselves to reduce their CO₂ emissions due to their mobility behavior. Swisscom’s goal is to save one million tons of CO₂ together with its customers by 2025.
For AMAG, the Swiss Climate Challenge is just one of many steps in terms of sustainability: Dino Graf emphasizes that this is part of the AMAG Group’s DNA. Many commitments and measures have been made since the 1950s. “AMAG employees have known this culture for many years, so the climate strategy endorsement rate among the workforce was high from the very beginning. When we asked executives in the spring of 2021 whether we should reach carbon neutrality as a company by 2030 or by 2025, more than 80 percent voted for 2025.”