Multifaceted environmental management
A high-level road network has a significant impact on the environment. So we give attention to environmental compatibility already during planning and construction.
During ongoing maintenance, an economical use of resources – especially of energy and water – is paramount. Other focus areas of our environmental management are noise, climate and species protection.
The rising volume of traffic, continued road construction and new safety regulations – for example for lighting in tunnels – increase the yearly costs. Despite this, in 2016 we succeeded in improving important environmental indicators: Thanks to efforts for conserving resources at our construction projects, we were able to increase our recycling rate by another 14.3% compared to 2015, and we reduced the use of road grit by 2.1%. The energy consumption increased slightly by +1.6%, but in relation to the mileage, it was actually reduced by 1.7%. For concrete measures against climate change, in 2016 we started a special programme for decarbonisation.
Another focus that was intensified in 2016 was our effort for biodiversity: We are taking additional steps to help maintain biodiversity among both animals and plants.
You can find details about our other work priorities and all of ASFINAG's environmental indicators in our 2016 sustainability report. It will be available online as of summer 2017.