Number of low carbon cars sold in the UK doubled in 2010
Tue 26 April 2011
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The number of low carbon cars - in Vehicle Excise Duty (VED) Band A - doubled to more than 57 thousand in 2010, compared with 2009, according to the latest vehicle licensing statistics published by the Department for Transport.
The number of cars in Band A (the lowest duty band, for cars emitting less than 100 g/km of CO2) has grown rapidly in the last three years. Prior to 2008, when around 3,700 vehicles in Band A were registered, annual sales were measured in the low hundreds.
Average tail-pipe CO2 emissions from all new cars registered in 2010 decreased to 144 g/km, down 4 per cent from the 2009 figure. This continues an established trend of decreasing average emissions from new-registered vehicles.
Diesel cars saw their share of the new car market rise from 41 per cent in 2009 to 46 per cent last year.
According to the Daily Telegraph, fears about the cost of fuel and, in some cases, concern about the environment has swelled sales of such cars as the Fiat 500 Twin-Air, Polo Blu Motion Toyota Prius and Smart Fortwo.
Demand was helped by a number of policies including the absence of an annual VED (road tax) charge for vehicles in this category. In addition, the scrappage scheme which ended in 2010 helped to boost sales of super-efficient Band A cars.
According to the latest DfT statistics the total number of cars on the road reached 28.4 million, 34 per cent more than in 1994.
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