Liberty sets van electrification target with home charging key

Property services business Liberty has pledged to switch 10% of its van fleet to pure electric power by 2024.

The current commercial fleet is made up of 847 vans, making it the company’s biggest contributor of CO2 emissions.

In 2021-22, Liberty used 1.32 million litres of diesel and petrol which equates to 3,282 tonnes of CO2.

In beginning to transition to electric vans, Liberty is engaging directly with its fleet drivers to identify those who would be eligible for its home charging solution.

Delivered in partnership with Hypervolt, this allows chargers to be installed at the drivers’ homes.

Charge usage will be monitored remotely by Liberty and reimbursed directly to drivers for charging their work vehicles at home.

Sam Greenwood, head of fleet at Liberty, explained: “Our target to have 10% of the commercial fleet fully electric by 2024 is an ambitious task made more challenging by the lack of public infrastructure.

“With the public charging network struggling to keep up with demand, we knew we had to be proactive to continue our mission to reduce CO2 emissions.

“By partnering with Hypervolt, we have been able to offer our drivers the chance to switch to electric vehicles without the worry about where to charge them.

“We’ve already begun the rollout and are keen to keep the momentum going with more and more of our drivers taking on electric vehicles.”

Warren Yates, senior supervisor at Liberty, who was one of the first Liberty drivers to receive an all-electric van, said: “After driving the new electric van for a couple of weeks I’m really pleased with it.

“The driving range was a concern before I got it, but I’m regularly seeing over 190 miles from a full charge on the mix of town driving that I do daily as part of my work on the Wigan County Borough Council contract.

“It’s a really impressive piece of technology, and so nice to drive, so the engineers in my team are now asking me when they can get one too.”

Meredydd Hughes, assistant director of building services for Portsmouth County Council, where Liberty has also started using its first all-electric vans, said she was pleased to see its contractors committing to EVs.

“Liberty is taking the necessary steps to achieve their goal of reducing emissions and establishing a complete electric fleet that all employees can use,” she added.

“Reducing emissions is an important step towards Portsmouth City Council's goal of Net Zero by 2030."