With green being the new black, and funeral director firms across the United Kingdom looking for ways to offset their carbon footprint, plenty of focus has been on funeral vehicles and the move away from petrol and diesel limousines and hearses. News feeds are increasingly populated with firms announcing the arrival of electric or hybrid fleets, with companies reporting consumer choice is already pointing firmly at the green agenda and the media covering the arrival of electric fleets into the funeral sector.
While some companies have already begun the transition, for those considering phasing out diesel or petrol vehicles in the near future, manufacturer Coleman Milne has some advice. As all funeral vehicles are converted from standard road cars that need significant modifications to achieve the size, presence, aesthetics and weight-carrying capacity required for a hearse or limousine, careful selection of the correct base vehicle to build upon is essential, the company said, pointing to the Mercedes plug-in hybrid hearse, which has been built, tested and has proved successful on the road.
A spokesman said the Mercedes is likely to be the last in the line of fossil fuel dependent funeral fleets, with emerging technology providing a stepping-stone to all future carbon neutral offerings, but will set the benchmark for electric vehicle operation and useability. The rapidly expanding market of new battery-powered cars has been halted, first by the COVID-19 pandemic – which led to a global shortage of semiconductors – and now the war in Ukraine, which has seen a huge slowdown in the supply of
important components exported from the country.
Further reading
We have a longer feature about fleets and fuel economy. You can find the full article from the May 2022 edition of Funeral Director Monthly on this link.
Continue your professional development
The NAFD’s revolutionary new learning platform – the NAFD Learning Hub – sits at the centre of the NAFD’s bold two-year plan for the introduction of mandatory Continuous Professional Development (CPD) within the NAFD, in line with the likely next steps that the Government will take. There is still time to secure a place in the NAFD Learning Hub pilot to help us shape this resource.