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BMW against Merkel's female board member quota in Germany

There may soon be more women in power positions in the world of German business under a proposed law from Chancellor Angela Merkel's coalition government. If passed, the law would force large, publicly traded corporations to have female members make up at least 30 percent of their supervisory boards (which are responsible in part for business strategy) by 2016. In addition, all companies would have to increase the female proportion on their management boards, which conduct regular business. The law seems likely to pass next month. "We've decided to do this and it will happen," said Merkel in a speech about the new rule, according to Bloomberg. Women currently have just six percent of management board seats in the country. Big businesses in the country aren't on board with proposed law, including automakers. "BMW as a company doesn't believe in quotas," said spokesperson Jochen Frey to Bloomberg. "While we hold that opinion, we want and strive for diversity in our workforce in terms of gender, ethnicity and age." Currently, 25 percent of Bimmer's supervisory board is female, a bit higher than the national average in Germany of 22 percent. German car companies are hardly alone when it comes to having a paucity of women in positions of power. Honda only added its first female member to the automaker's board of directors earlier this year, and Toyota and Nissan showed similarly low numbers. A 2013 list from Fortune ranked many of the most powerful women in the auto industry as coming from North America.

Recharge Wrap-up: New Mitsubishi Evo PHEV, Amsterdam buses go all electric by 2025

Mitsubishi hopes to launch a new vehicle badged as the Evo based on the Concept XR-PHEV II. Mitsubishi President and COO Tetsuro Aikawa tells Autocar the new vehicle will share characteristics with the outgoing Lancer Evolution loved by enthusiasts, but will feature a plug-in hybrid powertrain in the body of a compact crossover. "In Japanese, when you pronounce 'Oh,' it means 'king,'" says Aikawa. "So we would like to launch this type of car, featuring EV and PHEV technology, which is the ultimate of its kind. 'EV' for electric vehicle, 'O' for king - Evo." The Mitsu boss also envisions the four-wheel-drive Evo to be "light and fast - something performance-oriented." Read more at Autocar, or at Hybrid Cars. Amsterdam aims to have all its buses running on electric power by 2025. Within two years, the city will have 40 electric buses in operation, and will phase out the rest of the diesel fleet in the following years. "This project means we are saying goodbye to symbolic behavior and pilot projects," says transport alderman Abdeluheb Choho. "We have decided to just do it, not to experiment with five buses." Read more at Clean Technica. BMW and General Motors are both listed in the top five US organizations generating and using green energy onsite. In an EPA list, BMW's Spartanburg, South Carolina manufacturing facility is number four, with credit going to its use of landfill gas. In 2013, 69,383,477 kWh - or 37 percent of its total usage - came from green energy. GM's Fort Wayne Assembly was number five, with 43 percent of its power coming from methane from a nearby landfill. Volkwsagen also made the Top 30 list, at number 15, for its Chattanooga assembly plant's use of solar power. See the EPA's full list, and read more at Green Car Congress. Volkswagen will release its 2014 sustainability report on Twitter on Monday, May 4. It will be the first step in using the social medium to distribute information on economic, environmental and social sustainability to a larger audience. The report will include a section called "Electrifying China with a tailor-made efficiency strategy," which focuses on reducing CO2 emissions through the use of electric vehicles. Volkswagen has already begun releasing highlights from its report on its Twitter account with the hashtag #VWCSR. Read more in the press release below and, of course, on Twitter next week.

A look back on BMW, South Carolina and Southern manufacturing

It has been 20 years since BMW broke ground on its Spartanburg, SC manufacturing facility, and while the automaker doesn't have any plans to mark the moment, economists and industry analysts have taken a closer look at the facility's impact on South Carolina, the South and global manufacturing. As of November, the Spartanburg plant's 7,000 employees cranked out 25,000 vehicles per month, and BMW has poured some $6 billion into the state since the plant opened in 1993. While that figure nearly matches the state's proposed budget for next year, some say there have been drawbacks.
To begin with, South Carolina provided BMW with hundreds of millions of dollars worth of public money and tax breaks with little public oversight, setting a precedent that would repeat itself with other corporations. The Detroit News reports that a Pew Center evaluation found 26 states didn't have a sufficient system for evaluating tax incentive performance. But BMW opened the door for a Southern manufacturing renaissance, with automakers from Mercedes-Benz to Hyundai and Volkswagen opening plants in the Deep South.
While states have raced to offer ever sweeter tax and cash incentives for big manufacturers, officials say BMW is proof the system can pay dividends. You can read the full piece here.