Five million British drivers insist they won’t change the way they drive, even if it helps reduce emissions and lessen their environmental impact.
And the further North you get, the less people are willing to consider the environmental impact of their driving habits, according to a survey by connected car tech company Lightfoot.
Hard acceleration, late braking and heavy use of the air conditioning are all considered non-eco-friendly driving behaviours.
Just 1 in 4 Scottish drivers are willing to challenge such habits to help the environment: for those in the North East, the willingness to change plunges further, to 1 in 5 motorists.
Blissfully ignorant
Perhaps even more worryingly is that over half of 25-34 year olds simply don’t realise that changing your driving style can improve emissions and economy.
69 percent of respondents said that they couldn’t identify the driving behaviours and habits that increase emissions. 55 percent also didn’t know that heavy braking and air conditioning usage have a negative impact on emissions, for example.
Remarkably, 7 in 10 said that they didn’t know that stop-start was a fuel-saving system.
“A good driver can be 20 percent more efficient than a bad driver,” said Mark Roberts, CEO and Founder of Lightfoot.
“In the short term, not driving is not an option for everyone. We need to extend our green thinking to our driving style and make a real impact in reducing our emissions through better driving.”
Saving 1,000 cars’ worth of emissions
Lightfoot recently launched its ‘Breathe Exeter’ clean air initiative. It aims to save the equivalent of 1,000 cars’ worth of emissions by the end of the year. That’s how much it believes driving habits affect your emissions. Its ‘fitbit for cars’ is designed to draw more attention from drivers to the way they drive.
The University of Bath claims it reduces drivers’ fuel use and emissions by as much as 20 percent. Insurers and brokers report it reducing accident rates by as much as 80 percent.
“We want to show we can significantly cut emissions by making Exeter the first city-scale case study that proves the power of collective action,” continues Roberts.
“Jointly, we can create a blueprint for other cities to follow, proving that a social movement for change can have a bigger, more immediate impact than slow-moving national policy. Together, we can dramatically cut CO2 and NOx, through one simple action – smoother driving.”