Engineius

Engineius advises fleets not to overlook vehicle movement to cut emissions

Over 20 million vehicle movements occur in the UK each year, yet how many fleets take their movements into account when considering reducing their emissions and adopting the greenest practise?

It has been a common practice for chaser vehicles to be deployed when delivering a vehicle, or a minibus-style drop-off and pick-up to be adopted. Through extensive research with a large UK fleet, Engineius identified that for every 10 miles of vehicle movement needed, for a typical corporate fleet these practices actually meant that 24 miles were driven, more than doubling the driving miles and, even more worryingly, doubling the emissions.

Multiply that figure by the actual number of vehicle movements made and the distance of each movement for each fleet and the unnecessary additional miles and increase in emissions is simply staggering.

The whole fleet industry needs to reduce their emissions. The gradual transition to EVs is making a difference, but it’s not enough. Vehicle movement has not historically been an area of key focus towards achieving this goal. However, with the average fleet vehicle requiring 9 movements per year, it should not be overlooked.

Driving the vehicle from A to B eliminates those extra miles.

Advanced tech helps to empower logistics planning and automatically assigns suppliers onward journeys, and therefore minimises those ‘empty legs’ of unproductive miles. The matching and linking of movements and utilising public transport where necessary is critical to significantly reduce emissions from vehicle movement miles.

There are other benefits to fewer miles being driven, such as reducing congestion, increasing economic productivity and, crucially, lowering the risk of road injuries and deaths.

By implementing these tactics, fleets and businesses in all automotive sectors can more than halve their emissions connected with vehicle movement. In the last 12 months, Engineius has saved fleets tonnes of CO2 emissions with its greener approach.

Another surprising find from Engineius’ research was that EVs were being delivered on diesel transporters. This sits at odds with the green motivations for the new owner’s EV purchase.  Of course, the greenest option is to drive EVs, not transport them.

The handover with an EV is essential too. With thousands of EVs delivered by Engineius each month, the business understands that drivers must be well trained in offering this service. It is often the first EV for that customer, so it is important that the drivers leave them feeling confident to experience and enjoy their first all electric miles.

As a tech-enabled service Engineius strives to minimise emissions and offer the greenest credentials. They have paid to carbon offset their business with climate neutral expert, Climate Partner.

The business calculated its corporate carbon footprint, including emissions from sources such as energy and heating, business travel, office supplies and everything else produced in the operation of the company. This figure will be recalculated each year to monitor progress and identify additional areas for improvement.

Through Climate Partner, Engineius now supports an afforestation project in Nicaragua. Bamboo is one of the most efficient biological tools for fighting climate change. The project contributes to mitigation by preventing deforestation and capturing CO2 as well as to adaptation by reducing temperatures, creating micro-climates, supporting a low-carbon economy and creating livelihoods for vulnerable communities.

Next, Engineius plans to tackle the “tailpipe” emissions generated by the vehicle movement miles. Whilst we can’t avoid these emissions (we don’t select the vehicle that is moved or the locations in the movement), but we can offset them. Engineius and its customers will pay into schemes that remove the equivalent amount of carbon from the atmosphere as was emitted by each movement. This scheme will be launched later in 2022.

Engineius hopes its green credentials within the vehicle logistics sector will assist others in reducing the industry’s environmental impact.

Not using chaser vehicles, driving EVs for delivery and adopting an entirely digital process all contribute to making vehicle movement greener. Every positive change, no matter how small, makes a difference. These are small yet significant steps towards a greener environment, driven by technology and a genuine desire to promote a better tomorrow for the UK’s fleets.

About Engineius
Engineius is the leading vehicle movement service in the UK. The business was founded in 2018 on the belief that it should be as easy to book and manage vehicle movements as it is to buy from Amazon or ride with Uber.

Its bespoke technology enhances the end-user experience, allowing customers to track deliveries to their door across the UK via a network of over 500 fully trained drivers and agents managed fully in-house.

Engineius services leading clients across all fleet sectors including corporate fleets, SMR, rental, leasing, dealerships, remarketing and breakdown services.

For further details please contact Engineius.