Hankinson Take to the Road to Reduce Environmental Impact Back

Date published: October 5, 2017

Hankinson Group are continually working hard to lessen our environmental impact as a company, and in particular our C0₂ emissions.

As such, we have now taken delivery of our first electric company vehicle, and we have a charging port installed in our Head Office car park with a consideration that all future company cars will be either electric or hybrid vehicles as appropriate.

The benefit of using an electric vehicle is that they are ‘zero emissions’ vehicles, meaning that they have minimal impact on the environment.

Our electric vehicle has so far been averaging 4.5 miles to a kW. At an average cost of 15p per kW, that means that 100 miles would cost £3.33. On average, 100 miles for a diesel Ford Focus would cost £7.32, so electric vehicles make a financial saving as well as a significant environmental impact.

We are evaluating the possibility of introducing electric vans on appropriate sites, whilst recognising that there will still be restrictions on their use such as range; it is possible that the weight of a vehicle filled with materials and workers would reduce the average miles per kW of the vehicle, and may also inhibit our ability to carry out long-distance jobs from our local offices as bases since the vehicles would need to stop and recharge during their journeys.

However, as a national painting contractor that has a large fleet of company vehicles, the reduction in both C0₂ emissions and running costs would be dramatic. Currently our Ford Transit Custom vans emit 172g/km per year (per vehicle), and our Ford Transit Connect vans put out 129g/km in emissions per year (per vehicle).