During European Mobility Week 2010, which runs from 16 to 22 September, the company will bring a fleet of electric cars with lithium ion batteries around its various Spanish head offices for employees to test drive, among other related initiatives.
Endesa has signed up for European Mobility Week (EMW), the European Union campaign starting tomorrow to raise awareness among politicians, businesses and other institutions, not to mention citizens, of the importance of changing how we get around our towns and cities.
Putting its commitment into action, and dovetailing with its own business strategy, Endesa has launched a series of activities with a view to promoting sustainable mobility, which happens to be one of the key ways in which the company plans to promote the fight against climate change and contribute to the successful delivery of sustainability and economic development targets.
One of its specific initiatives, under the umbrella of EMW, which runs from 16-22 September, is to bring a fleet of electric vehicles around its various Spanish head offices for employee test driving.
Endesa has also launched a host of other initiatives with the same goals:
It has drafted its ‘Top ten mobility practices’ which have been distributed to all group employees.
It has distributed a video, internally and externally, explaining very practically the everyday maintenance of an electric car. This video can be viewed at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5J36AzacXc
The company has drawn up a plan to replace 30% of its short-haul vehicles with electric vehicles from next year. Endesa already has 13 pure electric vehicles in its fleet and in 2008 it began introducing the Toyota Prius into its sales fleet. The Toyota Prius is the first assembly line produced hybrid.
To make life easier for employees who own electric cars, the group has already installed charging points in the car parts at its various head offices (Madrid, Seville, Malaga and Mallorca). The company has also reserved dedicated parking spaces for bikes.
Endesa plans to continue to encourage its employees to eliminate unnecessary business travel by stimulating the use of the videoconferencing equipment installed in its various operating markets. The company estimates, very conservatively, that over the last three years this form of communication has prevented the emission of 4,100 tonnes of CO2.
It plans to conduct an employee survey to learn more about their mobility habits. The results will be used to analyse future initiatives in this arena.
There are also plans to set up a dedicated area within the intranet to promote private car pooling to help employees organise how to share commutes.
As expressed by the slogan selected for this tenth edition of EMW, “Travel Smarter, Live Better”, the campaign is designed to focus on the health aspects of mobility: health and sustainable mobility are emphasised as a combination that clearly enhances the quality of life in cities, helping to reduce air and noise pollution, accidents and congestion.
Endesa is working in this same direction. Indeed, in celebration of World Heart Day (26 September) the company has organised an employee heart disease prevention campaign which is to run all month.
History of European Mobility Week
The search for solutions to the problems associated with the growth in congestions in cities spawned an initiative designed to raise awareness of the need to make transport sustainable: the In Town Without My Car event, the first of which was held in France in 1998. By 2000, the event had garnered the political and financial support of the European Commission and the initiative’s success led to the launch in 2002 of the European Mobility Week, which now runs from 16 to 22 September every year. The event ends on 22 September with the In Town Without My Car Day.
Since it all began in 2002, the impact and reach of European Mobility Week have grown steadily, not only in Europe but worldwide. In 2009 a total of 2,181 towns and cities officially signed the EMW charter or registered their activities, engaging almost 237 million European citizens and translating into a total of 4,441 permanent measures mainly focused on infrastructure for cycling and walking, traffic calming, improving transport accessibility and raising awareness about sustainable travel behaviour. Participation in Spain has also been on the rise year after year, with record participation in 2009 by local authorities and other constituents of society:
ENDESA is participating in the project to test drive five plug-in Toyota Prius while Bergé will supply the company with its first two F3DMs as part of the Smartcity project in Malaga.
Other griddable commercial vehicles will also be rolled out to test V2G technology (vehicle to grid) which will enable electric vehicles to recharge, store the electricity and then return it to the grid when idle.
This plan is part of ENDESA’s staunch pledge to develop the electric vehicle (EV) as a means of promoting the fight against climate change and helping the company successfully meet its sustainability and economic growth objectives while at the same time creating value for shareholders.
Testimony of this commitment is the fact that in 2008 ENDESA included 400 Toyota Prius Hybrids, the first series of hybrid vehicles to be manufactured, in its sales network.This plan is part of ENDESA’s staunch pledge to develop the EV as a means of promoting the fight against climate change and helping the company successfully meet its sustainability and economic growth objectives while at the same time creating value for shareholders.
Testimony of this commitment is the fact that in 2008 ENDESA included 400 Toyota Prius Hybrids, the first series of hybrid vehicles to be manufactured, in its sales network.
Development of a sustainable transport policy based on the Electric Vehicles as a key tool for combating climate change is a cornerstone of Endesa’s Strategic Sustainability Plan 2008-2012.
In Spain, the company is involved in rolling out electric mobility projects (MOVELE project) in Madrid and Barcelona, and in the main technological initiatives (Cenit VERDE, DER22@ and REVE-Regulación Eólica con Vehículos Eléctricos projects).
