VW Puts Robots to Work Loading EV Batteries

Volkswagen hopes to slash CO2 emissions using robots to load its electric-vehicle batteries for shipping to assembly plants.

The automaker claims it will cut production emissions by about 12,000 tons per year, the expected annual CO2 emissions of a village with about 1,000 inhabitants.

To deliver the batteries to its Zwickau assembly plant in Germany, the cell modules are collected by rail from the battery supplier’s plant in Wroclaw, Poland, and first shipped to the Brunswick plant of Volkswagen Group Components. Rail transport in Germany uses 100% climate friendly sustainable electricity, as does the rail connection from Brunswick to Zwickau.

This connection also makes use of fully automated loading and unloading. Only for the last mile between the loading and unloading station at Harvesse and the factory at Brunswick are the shipment containers loaded onto electric trucks, because the rail system there does not yet extend to the assembly point.

VW has developed bespoke containers which can be used both for the battery cell modules and for fully assembled systems. They are designed to make maximum use of the weights and volumes allowed by the rail cars used. Currently, five trains travel between Brunswick and Zwickau weekly and the automaker expects this figure to increase.

Thomas Zernechel, head of Volkswagen Group Logistics, says, “With this green and efficient logistics chain, we are making a key contribution to reducing emissions within the group and to the delivery of the Volkswagen ID.3 and ID.4 (EVs) with a neutral carbon balance.”