From grey to green

Organisations that let their staff clock up grey fleet miles are missing an opportunity to reduce their costs and carbon emissions, says David Olima, commercial delivery manager and grey fleet lead at the Office of Government Commerce

Grey fleet mileage is the term given to business mileage driven by employees in their own cars. In the public sector, evidence indicates that grey fleet travel makes up around 57 per cent of total road mileage. Across the public sector these journeys could add up to over 1 billion miles and pump out an estimated 300,000 plus tonnes of CO2, annually, into the atmosphere.
    
While not necessarily the most cost effective form of travel, grey fleet travel is often seen as a convenient choice by employees when carrying out business journeys. Lack of overall visibility in most organisations of this form of travel means that the biggest source of road related carbon emissions is going relatively unchecked.
    
There is increasing focus on how sustainable organisations run their operations, and the need to reduce the impact operations have on the environment. Furthermore, government has set targets to reduce CO2 emissions by at least 34 per cent by 2020, relative to 1990 levels.

Aging vehicles
With the average age of grey fleet vehicles estimated to be 6.7 years it is not surprising that these vehicles are more polluting than managed fleets or alternative forms of transport. Industry figures put the average age of lease cars at 18 months and that of spot hire vehicles at about six months.
    
Technological advances in motor vehicle engineering means that over the last decade vehicles have become more efficient and less polluting. Today there is a wide selection of vehicles whose emissions are under the 120g/km of CO2 emissions which is less than the average fleet target government has set for car manufacturers by 2012.
    
The size of opportunity for reducing road related carbon emissions presented by grey fleet management has driven a number of organisations to proactively tackle this form of travel. In 2007 the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) commissioned a review of business travel in the department. The review highlighted that over two thirds of their travel was carried out in grey fleet vehicles.
    
Following the review a number of recommendations were implemented and the department now leads the pack in terms of actively managing its grey fleet.
    
Over the last two years DWP has reduced its grey fleet mileage by over 40 per cent and by the end of this financial year 09/10 is forecast to reduce its grey fleet mileage by about 24 million miles. This reduction has contributed to a 30 per cent reduction in carbon emissions from total road transport with grey fleet CO2 emissions dropping from just under 15,000 tonnes in 2006/07 to 9,000 tonnes in 2008/09.

Local government
The environmental benefits of tackling grey fleet travel are not restricted to large central government departments but have been seized by local authorities too. Derbyshire County council has embarked on tackling grey fleet by identifying the benefits moving grey fleet users to a fleet of pool cars. In a detailed desktop study carried out and trialled on a sample of vehicles from 13 vehicle manufacturers the council estimates that if it moved 30 per cent of its 8000 grey fleet users to pool cars they could reduce carbon emission by 1,253 tonnes annually. This would require a pool of 400 cars and could deliver over £900,000 in cost savings.
    
Similarly West Sussex council, winners of the Energy Saving Trust’s Grey fleet champion award 2009, has taken huge strides in managing this form of travel. In 2007 the council members of staff clocked up over 9.5 million miles, pumping out over 2,904 Tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere.
    
As part of their overall travel plan the council embarked on a number of initiatives to reduce this form of travel. These included introducing a free shuttle bus to transport members of staff to nearby offices as well as offering free car parking spaces for users who car shared into work. Since 2006 the number of people driving alone to work has reduced by 23 per cent which has had a positive impact on personal vehicles being used for work related journeys.
    
Andy Mouland, project officer at Travelwise states: “By simply reducing the number of users driving their own cars to work employees are less likely to travel on business journeys in grey fleet cars, resulting in a reduction in grey fleet travel from the council offices.
    
“This coupled with an efficiently managed and easily accessible fleet of 100 pool cars means that members of staff are a few clicks away from using a safe, cost effective and lower carbon emitting vehicle.
    
“Today the fleet of pool cars at West Sussex County Council has an average CO2 emission level of 124 g/km which is significantly lower than the average of 190 g/km for a typical grey fleet car.“
    
Since 2007 the council has reduced its grey fleet travel by one million miles, reducing carbon emissions by just over 300 tonnes and unlocking over £200 000 in savings in the process.

Health & safety
Apart from environmental and financial benefits, tackling grey fleet also has health and safety benefits. Organisations that have successfully transferred some of their grey fleet users to pool cars have benefited from improved safety levels because the cars are on average newer than grey fleet equivalents, are regularly maintained and have higher Euro New Car Assessment Programme (NCAP) safety ratings.
    
This combined with ensuring policies are in place to check driving documents and fitness of drivers helps reduce risks of failing to exercise the duty of care in regards to driving for work.
    
Similarly ensuring an organisation has the right checks and controls in place for the residual core of grey fleet users to ensure that these drivers are driving appropriately maintained vehicles, have appropriate insurance and driving documents will improve the safety of staff at work.

Help and support
The Office of Government Commerce working with members of the grey fleet forum has developed a grey fleet toolkit which aims to help organisations on their way to successful grey fleet management initiatives. The toolkit also includes the five-step process which sets out the steps that can be followed, giving initiative leads a guide on the resources required, stakeholders to involve and timelines for taking a grey fleet initiative from the initial proposal to implementation.
    
There is also an online community set up with the aim of facilitating the sharing of grey fleet best practice as well as equipping organisations with the tools and templates necessary to start a grey fleet project.
    
This virtual meeting point will ensure organisations are kept up-to-date with initiatives and practices being undertaken to help reduce cost, improve duty of care and reduce carbon emissions.
    
To access this community users will need to register with the I&DeA communities of practice website.
    
The OGC are working closely with the Carbon Trust and the Energy Saving Trust to help highlight the issues grey fleet presents, and support that is available. The Energy Saving Trust offers organisations with fleets of 50 or more vehicles, including grey fleet users, a free Green Fleet Review, results of which can provide organisations with information to inform the business case for a grey fleet initiative.
    
The Office of Government Commerce (OGC) is an independent office of HM Treasury, established to help government deliver best value from its spending.

For more information
For a copy of the OGC grey fleet toolkit please send an e-mail to greyfleet@ogc.gsi.gov.uk quoting reference GF001.
 
To find out more about Energy Saving Trust’s green fleet reviews please visit www.energysavingtrust.org.uk