Today is World EV Day, and you will see more ACT Government electric vehicles out and about.
Five new electric vehicles including a ute, two tipper trucks, one litter picking truck and a delivery van have recently joined the commercial fleet for trial within City Services to continue to provide essential services while cutting emissions. An additional four electric passenger vehicles have also joined the fleet.
These electric vehicles are assisting in everyday city maintenance activities. They may be spotted around the city assisting teams in getting mowing fleet and operators to site, cleaning shops and roadsides of litter and assisting the crews undertaking horticultural maintenance including pruning, mulching, collecting fallen branches and physical weed removal in urban open space.
Our maintenance crews are also using electric vehicles to support our street sweeping efforts and to scrub grime from footpaths. This helps reduce the need for pressure washing surfaces outside of the autumn leaf season.
One of the benefits of using electric vehicles to maintain our public spaces is that they produce less noise so they can be used in more locations early in the morning without disturbing nearby residents, improving overall efficiency.
There are 27 electric vehicle charging units across various ACT Government depots and sites to keep the fleet of electric vehicles active and ready for service.
The vehicle trials have been funded through the ACT Government's Social Cost of Carbon Fund and Zero Emission Government Fund.
Quotes attributable to Minister for City Services Tara Cheyne:
"Four new electric vehicles will support the work of our Place Management team including our mowing and horticulture crew and have arrived just in time for the start of the mowing season. The electric ute and tipper truck will be used by the team to help transport material and equipment on site.
"The new electric vehicles are reinforcing resources in our horticulture teams and expanding our baseline capacity to provide more mowing, litter picking and maintenance work across the city.
"An electric delivery van has also joined the fleet to support the team at Libraries ACT in providing the existing Home Library Service. The van will be used to deliver books, DVDs, CDs, magazines and other resources to community members who can't make it to the library and need reading material delivered to them.
"The van will also be shared with the Yarralumla Nursery to support plant deliveries to their wholesale customers.
Quotes attributable to Minister for Water, Energy and Emissions Reduction Shane Rattenbury:
"The ACT is a national leader in climate change and energy initiatives. To continue our leadership, we're working towards a target of net zero emissions from ACT Government operations by 2040.
"We are making good progress towards our target of a zero-emissions vehicle fleet, with over 220 electric vehicles in the ACT Government fleet. Making this transition will help reduce transport emissions, which is by far the largest source in the Territory accounting for more than 60 percent of the ACT's emissions.
"As the ACT continues on our pathway to electrification and net zero emissions in the Territory by 2045, it's exciting to roll out a variety of electric vehicles and show that increasingly there are electric alternatives for any job.
"Electric vehicles are growing in popularity and availability throughout the Territory, offering more opportunities for industry and community. I look forward to seeing more vehicles in a range of categories rolled out across our fleet in the future."
