The automotive industry is celebrating its 125th birthday

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cover story the interview 12 compact 2/2011 The mobile society of tomorrow “New ideas need chances” Whether commuter flows or west-east and north-south traffic: every day sees Europe traversed by vast columns of motor vehicles. Is the continent on the verge of a traffic collapse? EU Commission data tells us that tailbacks are already costing the European Union’s member states around one percent of overall gross domestic product (GDP). Rainer Bomba, Permanent Secretary of State at the Federal Transport Ministry, talks to compact about the situation and provides an outlook as to how Europeans will have to deal with the rising demand for mobility in the future. Railroad, car, airplane – for more than 100 years, engineers have been developing solutions to make people more mobile. How have the requirements changed? People’s needs have not changed to any great extent in the course of the past decades: they simply want to get from A to B as quickly and as inexpensively as possible. The aim, as before, is to organize movement without requiring an extensive outlay in terms of time and money. Improving noise protection and boosting road safety are two factors playing a bigger role today. And a new aspect is that of environmental and climate protection. This is something we aim to take account of without putting any restrictions on mobility. After all, mobility is absolute essential to global growth and a basic element of individual freedom. We do not and cannot hamstring it. Will mobility remain controllable in spite of growing traffic? Most certainly. Germany is situated at the heart of Europe, and is logistics country number one. Against this background we expect the volume of goods traffic to have increased by some 70 percent by 2025. That means we have to maintain the substance of our traffic infrastructure and make even more optimal use of the capacities through intensified use of traffic control systems. In some cases we will have to build new infrastructure or expand existing set-ups, however. Our “Goods traffic and logistics” action plan brings these approaches together. Basically, it is a matter of preventing the traffic infrastructure from becoming a bottleneck in terms of our economic development. How do you actually envisage the traffic system of the future? It will be intermodal, intelligently combining road, rail, water-borne and air traffic. With this in mind we think in mobility chains – in terms of the link-up of car and local public transport where passenger transport is concerned, or in terms of combined transport where goods transportation is concerned. Then we will be seeing the modernization and expansion of our rail and road network, especially at traffic hubs which are heavily used as result of the growing north-south and west-east traffic. We shall be working on intelligent traffic systems in order to boost efficiency, for example telematics systems on our motorways. Within this framework the traffic will be controlled via traffic management systems with speed, lane occupancy and overtaking-prohibition regulations, thus improving the traffic flow significantly. The “Road traffic telematics 2015 project plan” published in November 2010 provides for 138 projects and an investment volume of over 300 million euros to this end. And now to the topic of the environment: what role do new types of vehicle play? New concepts, such as electromobility or fuel-efficient vehicles and the development of second and third-generation biofuels are decisive contributory factors towards sustainable mobility. It is not yet possible at
present to estimate all of the impacts of our dependence on oil on mobility. Nevertheless, what we certainly can foresee is a price spiral in this area. And then there are the resolutions adopted at the UN climate conference, not least as a result of pressure from the federal government. We have to comply all the more with the restriction on greenhouse gas emissions as provided for there. As deputy chairman of the German government’s National Electromobility Platform (NEP), what is your assessment of the second progress report that was presented in May? It continues on from the first report, and reflects the intensive work and intermeshing of the various working groups. I am highly impressed at the way in which 146 scientists, engineers, association representatives and politicians in seven working groups are working together on the most difficult of topics in such a cooperative and solutionorientated way. The NEP will continue to exist in the future as well, and present the Federal Chancellor with an annual report. These reports will include experiences and results from the building up of what we call “regional showcases”, in other words selfcontained electromobility regions. The reports will also include experiences and findings gathered from the technical “beacon projects”, the innovations generated in the spheres of German research and industry. The important thing is for us to remain open to new technologies and systems in order to arrive at where we want to be by 2050. New ideas need chances, including, for example, the development approaches in the area of hydrogen and fuel cells, especially with the truck and local public transport traffic in mind. Pinning our faith solely on lithium-ion batteries and battery-driven vehicles would without doubt be too static. Is the cooperation in the sphere of electromobility also the result of awareness on the German side that, while excellently positioned with huge export volumes based on old standards, the country is about to miss out on a major innovative advance? the interview cover story Rainer Bomba is Permanent State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Transport, Building and Urban Development (BMVBS), where he is responsible for the directorates-general of Infrastructure, Environmental Policy, Construction Industry and Federal Buildings, Spatial Planning, Road Construction and Departmental Policy Issues. He has recently headed the National Electromobility Platform as deputy chairman. Born in Schlüchtern (federal state of Hesse), the mechanical engineer and economist initially worked in the private sector before joining the Hesse regional employment office at the administrative level. In 2002/2003 he worked on the establishment of the Berlin representation of the Federal Employment Agency, after which he spent the period between 2003 and 2007 in various federal states as deputy in case of absence of the chairmen of the respective regional directorates of the Federal Employment Agency. From 2007 till 2009 he was chairman of the Bavaria regional directorate of the Federal Employment Agency. After the parliamentary elections in 2009 he was appointed to his present position as Permanent State Secretary at the BMVBS. compact 2/2011 13
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