Greencabs – Toyota Prius taxi fleet

Written By: - Date published: 10:06 am, December 11th, 2007 - 7 comments
Categories: climate change - Tags:

greencabsrhside2.jpg

There’s a new taxi fleet servicing Wellington and (in three days time) Auckland.

The vehicles are all Toyota Prius hybrids and the company, Greencabs, also offsets the residual emissions making it, they claim, the country’s first carbon neutral taxi company.

They tell me they’re also the cheapest in town – presumably because the fuel consumption of the fleet is so much lower.

They’ve apparently got about a dozen cabs in Wellington, increasing shortly to 20 or so and it sounds like they’ll launch in Auckland with around 30 cars.

7 comments on “Greencabs – Toyota Prius taxi fleet ”

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  1. PhilBest 1
    11 December 2007 at 10:47 am

    Well, well, well, don’t say THIS is the solution to our Kyoto obligations? I thought that it was essential that we stop building roads.

  2. Matthew Pilott 2
    11 December 2007 at 10:55 am

    Na PhilBest, we need to take state control of the taxi industry, and only have these cabs.

    Plus add a bit of public transport, then we’ll ban cars unless you get a permit from the State Motor Vehile Bureau.

    You’ll then get to choose whether you want a Zil or a Lada.

  3. Policy Parrot 3
    11 December 2007 at 11:41 am

    I have an issue with the claim that they would be the cheapest cabs…

    Typically, taxi companies might buy new or near-new second hand cars but this is far from a universal truth. Currently, its almost impossible to get your hands on a second hand Prius in the numbers they are talking about.

    Their non-current assets (vehicles) will have massive depreciation costs and that will have to factored into an appropriate costing structure. It still probably will be cheaper (and greener) – but it depends how long they keep each Prius on the road for as to whether it will actually be much cheaper.

    Good direction to go in though, however many cab firms already use LPG gas for their fleets. I really can’t see it being much cheaper, even though I would want it to be…

  4. PhilBest 4
    11 December 2007 at 11:54 am

    Did you know that cars emmissions drop by a factor of about 90% every 10 years anyway as their engines get more advanced in design?

  5. Robinsod 5
    11 December 2007 at 11:58 am

    Hey PP – Hybrids hold their value well so actual depreciation will be slower than with normal cars. What I can’t understand is why they are not using civic hybrids as they are $12k cheaper and generally nicer cars.

  6. Phil 6
    11 December 2007 at 1:19 pm

    Hmmm, state control of the taxi industry… clearly you’ve never tried to catch a cab in Canberra

  7. insider 7
    11 December 2007 at 1:29 pm

    I think it would be an interesting project to actually monitor comparative fuel consumption. You would expect it to be lower anyway as they are much smaller than the traditional V6 taxis.