THE all-electric Renault Zoe will be helping to save lives and some of the UK’s most beautiful scenery after the Scottish Fire & Rescue Service ordered 45 as support for its frontline operations nationwide.
Uniformed staff, office employees and management will use the zero-emissions vehicles as general pool cars – with each Zoe covering at least 10,000 miles a year – to interact with the public in non-emergencies such as free home safety visits and community events, travelling as far as Orkney and the Shetland Islands.
The new Zoes, which have a range of up to 186 miles, are the service’s first pure-electric vehicles and replace traditionally fuelled hatchbacks, accounting for nearly a quarter of the pool car fleet, and will be based at strategic station locations, with the service installing up to six charging points at each site. Additional charging will also be carried out via ChargePlace Scotland – the country’s government-supported public EV charging network.
Scottish Fire & Rescue Service fleet manager Scott Roberts said: ‘The best way to deal with an emergency is to prevent it from happening, and the Zoes will play a vital role in how we engage with communities and deliver our crucial safety messages. The Renault Zoe’s range and the vastly improved charging infrastructure mean we have been able to spread them far and wide, and there’s not a nook or cranny of Scotland that one of our Zoes isn’t able to cover.
‘Perfect’
‘Introducing them has been a major step in our future direction, and while we have previously adopted hybrid technology with a handful of vehicles, they felt more like a box-ticking exercise and never really worked on a practical or financial basis.
‘With the Zoe, we can see that having environmentally compatible electric vehicles is a viable business model, allowing us to reduce our carbon footprint, preserve the country we are so passionate about and provide our team with a vehicle that is perfect for their requirements.’
Vincent Tourette, managing director of Renault UK, said: ‘The work performed by the Scottish Fire & Rescue Service is invaluable and we’re delighted that they have called on the Renault Zoe to help them efficiently spread important, life-saving messages and commence its ambition to electrify its entire fleet.
‘With the Zoes being deployed in many rural communities and by a whole variety of drivers, it’s a fantastic illustration of how versatile and usable a car it is.’
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