Ambulance service introduce environmental vehicle fleet

The North East Ambulance Service has deployed five fully electric Nissan Leaf pool cars, as part of their measures to reduce fuel use and cut its carbon footprint.

The vehicles replace five conventionally-powered models. With the North East Ambulance Service covering an area of 3,200 miles across County Durham, Northumberland, and Tyne and Wear the move into electric vehicles aims to reduce carbon emissions and fuel costs of the service.

Clare Swift, environment and sustainability manager, North East Ambulance Service, commented “The uptake of electric vehicles was vital for the Ambulance Service. We aim to be proactive in promoting a cleaner environment and the use of electric vehicles also enables us to save money on high fuel costs.”

A network of nine charging points across the region, the first UK installations by Dutch company ICU, will support the change. The ICU EVe charging points are they only areas available in the UK which offer technology for smart charging, meaning that it is possible to manage energy usage at times of peak demand to avoid overloading the grid.

The news comes following Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust replacing 13 of its fleet with Nissan e-NV200 electric vans. The new vans are expected to cut transport costs by 80 percent, while reducing annual CO2 emissions by 59 tonnes.

Michael Taylor, responsible for the Trust’s fleet, said “With increasing financial challenges on the NHS, we needed to make the service more efficient while being more environmentally friendly. We’ve been very impressed with the vehicles performance and it has also helped to change perceptions of electric vehicles amongst staff.”

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