When it comes to New Zealand’s transport decarbonisation journey, while the train has left the station, we’re still building some of the tracks, according to Auckland Council’s General Manager of Corporate Support Services, Anita Furniss.
Furniss was speaking at the recent New Age of Mobility roundtable co-hosted by the New Zealand Herald and Custom Fleet in Auckland where participants agreed the journey to decarbonisation remains a challenge with transport accounting for 17 per cent of the country’s gross greenhouse gas emissions.
Co-host of the roundtable, Custom Fleet President, Chris Tulloch said the transport sector hasn’t had a large amount of disruption over the last 50 years as the internal combustion engine has mostly remained omnipotent.
He says change has now arrived and the challenge for every organisation is how to move “their people, product or things from one point to the other in the most effective, efficient, safest way possible, with the aim of doing so as sustainably as possible”.
According to participants at the roundtable, every organisation is at a different stage of their decarbonisation journey depending on their core business.
For example, organisations with diverse vehicle needs, such as emergency services and construction companies, face additional challenges in finding suitable low-emission alternatives for their specialised requirements. This is something the government’s own Electrification Roadmap has identified - as heavy EVs in terms of models and volume remains limited.
Bearing this in mind, ensuring the fleet is fit for purpose is the driving purpose for New Zealand Police as well says the Acting Director of the NZ Police Property and Fleet group, Inspector Brian Yanko.
“When you look at the pointy end which is obviously around our cars with lightbars, sirens and stickers which respond to the everyday calls, our primary concern is capability,” Yanko says.
“We’re not looking at a vehicle we’re looking at a capability.”
Yanko says the department are taking their decarbonisation journey very seriously and originally thought about just replacing their administration vehicles with EVs and hybrids which would have been the easy option but the department looked to challenge itself.
So, with some extra funding the NZ police bought some BMW i4 EVs and put them into service as part of their road patrol fleet.
Yanko says the vehicles were bought to provide proof of concept and generally completed a shift before they were put on a charger.
Yet while the police were able to get some great learnings about the capability of EVs in frontline policing, they’re not yet fit for purpose due to the nature of police work.
For example, police vehicles generally need to head towards trouble rather than away from it such as during Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023.
“When everything is on the way out and we lose infrastructure, we can’t become incapacitated within a 24-hour period at a time when calls for service are going through the roof. We have to keep mobilised and ensure our capabilities can withstand what’s happening especially in rural and remote areas,” Yanko says.
Bearing this in mind, it’s hard to look at EVs as the only solution, rather there are plenty of others available when it comes to not only decarbonising a fleet but also making it more sustainable.
Participants all agreed technology plays a big part especially the use of telematics which assist fleet managers better understand how their fleet is being used so they can maximise its productivity.
Managing Director of OCS New Zealand and Australia, Gareth Marriott says the global facilities management services company has cut emissions intensity in New Zealand by 52 per cent since 2017 and transitioned 16 per cent of its fleet to electric, hybrid or plug-in hybrid electric vehicles.
At OCS, we’ve seen first-hand that cutting emissions isn’t just about switching vehicles – it’s about rethinking how people move. That’s why collaboration with government is so important, because creative solutions like better public transport access can take pressure off fleets and accelerate decarbonisation.
He suggests business and government need to think creatively together and look at how to move people more efficiently such as potentially issuing bus vouchers so there’s more take-up of public transport.
“We’re on our carbon journey and we’re already at net zero across our operations but we continue to look for innovative solutions with our goal being that we’ll have 100 per cent of our fleet electrified by 2028,” Marriott says.
Furniss says Auckland Council has many of the same challenges around the diversity of its fleet and balancing the broader considerations around capability when it comes to ensuring the thousands of building inspectors, park rangers and emergency services personnel can move around efficiently.
“These people are all out on the road every day making sure we actually deliver on the needs of our communities through the services we deliver. Getting the balance right between sustainability and delivering our services is key for us,” Furniss says.
Fellow roundtable participant, Watercare Services Head of Operations Support, Mathew Telfer, says Watercare face similar challenges who are responsible for delivering water and wastewater services to 1.7 million Aucklanders every day.
“We have exactly the same concerns and risks as an essential service. When everything else stops, we have to keep going,” Telfer says.
“Taking this into account, if we are going to go to a fully electric environment, how does that work?”
“Our staff are on 24/7 so the ability to be able to give them a car from their home and get them to where they need to be at two o’clock in the morning is a real fundamental aspect for us. Unfortunately, the fully electric option just doesn’t really fit with that at the moment.”
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