BERLIN, April 25 (Xinhua) -- Robert Bosch GmbH (Bosch), the world's largest automotive parts supplier, announced a new exhaust gas treatment technology and issued a defense of diesel on Wednesday.
"There are technical solutions to the Nitrogen Oxide (Nox) problem in street traffic," chief executive officer Volkmar Denner said at the presentation of Bosch's annual earnings figures for 2017.
Denner was responding to mounting calls in Germany to impose driving bans on diesel vehicles as a means to improve urban air quality.
Diesel motor-related products still accounted for around half of record total revenue of 78.1 billion euros (95.1 billion U.S. dollars), up 6.8 percent year on year, at Bosch in 2017.
Last year, operative profit rose by 17 percent to the highest ever level of 5.3 billion euros.
Chief financial officer Stefan Asenkerschbaumer set out modest goal for revenue growth of between two and three percent for 2018 whilst vowing to further increase profitability.
Bosch will also introduce a new ethical codex in response to revelations in the "dieselgate" scandal to prevent any future involvement in emissions-cheating practices.
Defending the tarnished reputation of diesel vehicles, Denner announced that the Gerlingen-based company had developed a new system which would dramatically lower NOx emissions from everyday use.
The European Union has threatened to sue before the European Court of Justice (JCEU) unless Berlin swiftly ensures the full compliance of German cities with EU NOx pollution limits.
"Following our technological break-through we are certain: No one will be able to impose blanket bans on diesel vehicles in cities," Denner said.
Denner also said that his company was simultaneously investing billions of euros in electric mobility.
Nevertheless, he insisted that the wider industry needed "highly-efficient conventional propulsion systems until electric-mobility can be feasibly-used in mass markets".
