Fleets are under pressure to go green and cut costs

Cost cutting and environmental concerns were the two big themes of the inaugural Fleet News/RAC roundtable with fleets coming under pressure to reduce overheads and set the green agenda.

The environment and carbon output reduction is being driven as much by customers as it is internally.

But alternative fuels are given short shrift by several fleets.

Terry Melton, fleet manager at Waltham Abbey-based Apollo Group, says: “When we tender for council work we are now often asked about alternative fuels.

"We looked at electric vehicles with a 100-mile range but the costs of £52,000 for a Ford Transit and £9,000 per battery, which is guaranteed for five years and last for seven, mean we couldn’t justify it.”