Reducing pollution through leasing and automotive rental

European businesses demand and need more energy efficient assets. However, the cost of upgrading equipment to more energy efficient models is often one of the biggest factors dissuading companies from investing in greener equipment, especially with regulatory standards rapidly evolving. Leasing can help firms gain access to the necessary assets quickly, and allow upgrading to ensure that the newest regulatory standards are met. By bringing the cleanest, newest and safest equipment and vehicles to the market, leasing companies not only rejuvenate and modernize Europe’s vehicle fleet and equipment stock, but also ensure the assets they finance keep strong remarketing values for a second or third life. 

Our industry plays a pivotal role in registering the cleanest passenger cars and commercial vehicles with European fleets, thereby significantly improving the environmental impact of mobility. By allowing and encouraging the uptake of clean vehicle technology, the leased car fleet in Europe has become steadily less polluting over the past few years. Leasing has also contributed to the rejuvenation of European commercial vehicle and bus fleets in order to adopt necessary fuel-saving and safety technologies. Leasing companies are able to take a comprehensive and long-term view of vehicle costs and performance. New remote diagnostic and prognostic capabilities will enable fleet managers to respond much faster to vehicle performance issues, predicting problems before they have occurred and reducing downtime. This means fewer breakdowns, more optimal engine performance, and the ability to do more with fewer vehicles. In commercial road transport, optimised vehicle servicing can decrease fuel costs by approximately €10,000 euro per vehicle per year, reducing emissions per vehicle by approximately 18 tons of CO2. Moreover, leasing companies also ensure the best maintained vehicles enter the nearly new car market.

Leasing addresses one of the general barriers that inhibits the development of sustainable energy production, i.e. a lack of access to capital. In fact, leasing already facilitates the financing of equipment such as wind turbines, biofuel processing plants, photovoltaic panels, long lasting battery cells and so forth, allowing Europe to produce cleaner and more sustainable energy.

The real estate and construction sectors have a major impact on energy consumption and will play an important role in helping the EU reach its sustainability goals through their Renovation Wave initiative. The construction equipment required for this increased amount of renovation work is often provided through leasing, which remains an important partner for investing in further equipment needs. In addition, lessors can help construction firms transition into using more energy efficient equipment for their projects, as the demand for more sustainable methods of building also escalates.

Leasing not only helps in replacing old, polluting equipment with cleaner and more energy efficient assets, it can also encourage the efficient use of scarce natural resources through re-leasing, refurbishing, reusing or recycling. Leasing and automotive rental firms are asset specialists, therefore managing these assets throughout their lifecycle is very much at the heart of their business. Lessors have specialised asset knowledge and sophisticated asset management capabilities to deal with the often complex issues that arise with ownership, and are particularly well placed to reuse and recycle assets responsibly. Thus, leasing enables a more efficient allocation of resources than when (non-specialist) individual businesses own assets outright.