The history of environmental protection at Bosch

“Turn those spare lights off!” Everyone was familiar with these warnings, from the young apprentice who first saw Robert Bosch making the rounds of the workshops, to the bookkeeper who saw the company founder rounding the corner from his position at the first desk up front. Robert Bosch’s aversion to wasting electricity and his thunderous reproaches for any associate discovered doing so took on an almost mythical status. But it was much more than just one of his particular idiosyncrasies. From the early days of his workshop, Bosch was focused on not wasting resources. For him, a keen sense of economic efficiency and a far-reaching awareness of responsibility were fundamental for successful business.

Environmental protection was not simply limited to an anchoring principle in corporate activities. Instead, it was also established as an element in the development of products. In 1967, Bosch took a crucial step toward reducing car exhaust emissions with the D-Jetronic — the first electronically controlled gasoline-injection system. The D-Jetronic helped newly registered vehicle types meet the requirements for lower pollutant emissions. Not only did this technology reach the goal of lowering emissions, but it also had the handy side effect of reducing both fuel consumption and spending. Further development of injection systems continued in the same vein, enabling ever greater economy in vehicle engines. The new injectors combined with a three-way catalytic converter and the lambda probe developed by Bosch (1976) to improve the combustion process and reduce exhaust gases by as much as 90 percent.

Since the second half of the 1960s, however, Bosch has also been researching alternatives to the internal-combustion engine as a powertrain. In the 1970s, Bosch showcased electric prototypes, as well as hybrid prototypes, which combined electric motors with internal-combustion engines.

No less pioneering was the Junkers Tritherm experimental house completed by the thermotechnology division in 1976. The single-family home was heated by three sources: solar energy, outside air, and gas. It provided engineers with important insight into the optimum interaction between the solar panels, heat storage tanks, and heat pumps on the one hand, and the gas-fired heating system on the other. Under optimum conditions, the design reduced the amount of energy needed from fossil sources by 90 percent. Far removed from the high figures achieved in experiments like these, the Bosch developers of washing machines, refrigerators, and heaters were hard at work chipping away at water, electricity, and gas consumption in mass-produced items. Their efforts have really added up over time; for example, Bosch refrigeration devices now use as much as 80 percent less energy than in 1990.