STS member Ben Lane of Ecolane ltd has launched a new web site to help consumers choose lower emission vehicles. WhatGreenCar? is the only green car website to give an independent life-cycle environmental rating for all new cars in the UK. For car-buyers who are after a cute city runaround, a family saloon or an executive auto, WhatGreenCar? provides the ultimate guide to buying the most eco-friendly car.
The WhatGreenCar? rating system has been designed to be easy to understand – the impact for each car is expressed as a score between 0 and 100 - the lower the score, the less the environmental impact. For comparison, an average small family car, such as the Ford Focus 2.0 TDCi, has a rating of around 50.
WhatGreenCar? ratings are based on a database of over 16,000 cars available in the UK, which is updated every two weeks. Rather than simply recommending the greenest cars on the market, WhatGreenCar? identifies the Top 10+ green cars in each class. That way, green car recommendations are made to suit almost any type of driver. WhatGreenCar? also provides a simple look-up facility for all UK cars registered since 2001 so that consumers can see the environmental impact of their current car.
WhatGreenCar? is the only green car website to give an environmental rating for all new cars based on the life cycle impacts of eight emissions including carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides and particulates. Unlike the government's new ranking system, which only assesses CO2 exhaust (tailpipe) emissions, WhatGreenCar?’s ratings also assess the emissions associated with a vehicle’s use and manufacture.
WhatGreenCar? has already received extensive press coverage and is establishing strong links with key organisations within the automotive sector. One of our first major partnerships has been to assist MSN cars with providing top-quality information and ratings for visitors to their site. WhatGreenCar? will be working with other information providers to ensure that the WhatGreenCar? rating system becomes widely used throughout the industry and becomes well known to the general public.
