In accordance with the plan laid down by Roads and Transport Authority (RTA), Dubai, 90 percent of Dubai’s fleets which includes private taxis such as Careem and Uber, will be environment-friendly by 2026. The plan further lists down that 65 percent of the vehicles will be hybrid-vehicles and 25 percent will be electric vehicles.
RTA has set annual targets to make vehicles go green. At present, only 6 percent of the vehicles are eco-friendly and this percentage will be increased to 10 percent by 2020, doubled up to 20 percent in 2021, 30 percent by 2022 and further 10 percent every year to finally reach 90 percent in 2026.
“Nearly 6,500 limos are operated in Dubai by 100 companies or more. Each vehicle travels about 400 km per day, which translates into the production of 44 tonnes of carbon emissions per annum.”
“The step is part of a master plan to curb carbon emissions of taxis and limos by two percent, as required by the Dubai Supreme Council of Energy and the Green Economy drive. It also comes in the aftermath of fuel deregulation policy and the low cost of electric/hybrid vehicles life span compared with fuel-powered vehicles.”
– Mattar Al Tayer – Director-general, RTA
Mattar further stated that this move should not be imposed as a financial burden on taxi operators, hence provide an incentive to make it easy on them.
“RTA studies on the use of electric/hybrid vehicles showed that financial savings of using electric vehicles amount to Dh20,000 over the life cycle of each vehicle.”
“Hybrid vehicles make a saving of Dh30,000. From an environmental perspective, electric vehicles do not have any harmful emissions, while the use of hybrid vehicles cuts emissions by 40 percent.”
The RTA will be offering 25 percent discount on the monthly franchise fees on electric vehicles throughout the first year. It will also permit electric vehicles to use bus-dedicated lanes, in addition to increasing electric vehicles life span to two years more than fuel-powered vehicles.
Moreover, the Middle East’s taxi rental giant Careem has already initiated the process of going green by launching the first electric car option last month.
Source: ArabianBusiness, TheNational.ae
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