Sustainability at the heart of LeasePlan

Sustainability lies at the heart of what we do. After all, when you manage nearly two million vehicles, you have the ability to make a real difference to the world.

This is why we have a business target of reaching net zero emissions from our entire vehicle fleet by 2030, with our internal fleet getting there by the end of 2021. It's also the reason we carry out a huge amount of work to encourage our customers and suppliers - in fact, the whole industry - to take a greener approach.

We're part of the Climate Group EV100 and have partnerships with the Land Life company, Global Action Plan (GAP) and GreenTV - the founder of World EV Day. This allows us to help drive the debate forwards and get the message out as widely as possible.

We also run live events, create podcasts and videos, host webinars and produce research papers to demonstrate that zero-emission vehicles are a viable proposition. This includes pieces on range concerns and the affordability of EVs. For example, we publish our Europe-wide Car Cost Index on a yearly basis and our latest analysis shows that mid-range EVs are now cost-competitive with the most common diesel and petrol engine cars.

For companies and organisations, there's our dedicated Consultancy Services Team. They provide information and insights about EVs, plus they can help set up fully scalable pilot programmes that can give customers the confidence to make the switch.

In addition, we have our new EV salary sacrifice scheme that could really help to drive EV take-up, as it is one of the cheapest ways to get an electric vehicle. We also offer a free online driver EV tool to help people decide if they are ready to start electric.

On top of all that, we work closely with vehicle manufacturers and infrastructure providers on technological developments, and we lobby governments to make changes. Our most recent campaign is the global 'ChargeUp Now' initiative that calls on policymakers to develop the necessary infrastructure for EVs.

It's not for nothing that we've received a number of awards and accolades for our work. In particular, we were GreenFleet's Leasing Company of the Year in 2018 and 2019 - plus Highly Commended in 2020.