Fleet finds its carbon footprint is
falling

 

Recent government figures show that a quarter of the UK’s carbon
emissions are produced by the transport sector, meaning tackling
levels of CO2 released through travel must be a priority for
policymakers. ALD
Automotive’s study into company car emissions is therefore
welcome news, as the fleet management and leasing company found
that the CO2 output from the company cars it provides has
fallen by 40 per cent in four years.

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The fall has come about, ALD reported, thanks to a twin-pronged
approach of encouraging drivers into lower-emitting cars, and
reducing business mileages.

The findings are based on ALD’s own 47,000-strong fleet, and,
extrapolated across the UK company car parc, the saved carbon per
year amounts to some 3m tonnes, ALD calculated – although whether
all company cars are as green as ALD’s is open to
question.

The lessor reported that the CO2 emissions of a car delivered in
January 2003 averaged 166.9 g/km; by August 2007 this had fallen to
154.2 g/km, a reduction of 7.6 per cent.

Likewise, average annual mileage fell from 23,782 miles to
15,139 between the same dates, meaning over a third fewer miles
were travelled by drivers in ALD’s cars.

Both figures have fallen sharply, especially since February 2006
which marked a “sea-change” moment, ALD said.

ALD Automotive marketing director David
Yates said: “We have tracked a remarkable transformation in our
fleet in terms of both the type of company cars increasingly chosen
by businesses and their drivers, and the amount of mileage clocked
up.”

The move to a greener fleet has benefits both for the
environment and for companies’ bottom line, ALD pointed out, with
lower-emitting vehicles subject to lower benefit-in-kind taxation
rates.