To no one’s surprise, the UK Electric Fleet Alliance is promoting the switch to electric vehicles for corporations in the UK to help reduce our carbon footprint. The goal to implement the sales of all new cars, trucks and vans to be electric by 2030 is possible with government assistance. The impact on fleet insurance is yet to be fully understood, but expect changes as electric fleets replace the combustion engine.
At present, the UK has mandated all new vehicles being sold not to be powered by fossil fuels is 2040. The aim of moving that date to 2030 is possible if the infrastructure is in place so electric vehicles can be recharged as readily as petrol power vehicles are today. It would encourage more corporations to convert their fleets of vehicles to electric. This is the aim of a non-profit organization called The Climate Group.
To date, The Climate Group, BT Group, Open reach along with 28 other corporations in the UK that operate fleets of vehicles have committed to converting their fleets to electric power. This initiative is called the EV100 has commitments by major UK businesses where more than 2.5 million vehicles will be using electrical propulsion or zero emission vehicles in their fleets by the year 2030.
To make this project feasible, charging units will have to be installed where these fleets of vehicles can have access to them, including their offices and other business buildings. So far this commitment by corporate UK has exceeded 3000 recharging units.
Another problem facing corporate UK is the types of vehicles needed to be powered by a low emission power source. Clive Selley, CEO, Openreach said: “With the country’s second-largest fleet of vans, I want Open reach to play a leading role in the UK’s transition to low carbon vehicles. But there are still some major hurdles to overcome. For example, the kinds of vehicles, scale of manufacturing, supply-chains and infrastructure needed to electrify large fleets like ours simply doesn’t exist today. So we need Government support to make the transition faster and fuller, and the commitment to maintaining plug-in grants is a welcome first step.”
With the need for new types of electric powered vehicles, a new business opportunity is unfolding in the UK. There are already suppliers of cars and small trucks along with large lorries, but the need for vans, mid-size lorries and construction equipment manufacturers is evident.
The only path for the UK to obtaining a net zero emissions by the target year 2045 is to have this new business sector to begin operating as soon as possible. The goal is possible, but governmental support will be necessary.
