North Herts District Council’s (NHDC) community safety team has started using new ultra low emission vehicles (ULEVs) to help lower its environmental impact.
The Mitsubishi hybrid vehicles switch between battery power and unleaded petrol during use, and produce approximately 40g of CO2 gases per kilometre – below the ULEV limit and less than the team’s previous diesel cars.
The ULEVs are leased to the council, whose environmental crime officers drive up to 250 miles a week across the district, following up on reports of fly-tipping, abandoned cars, graffiti and other environmental crime.
Cllr Steve Jarvis, NHDC’s executive member for environment, said: “The use of hybrid vehicles is part of our commitment to fight climate change, improve local air quality and build upon our pledge to achieve net zero carbon emissions in North Herts by 2030 as part of our Climate Change Strategy.”
The decision to use ULEVs was made by council in July 2019 when a motion was passed declaring that all NHDC vehicles would be replaced with environmentally-friendly vehicles when their leases came up for renewal.
