Enforcement measures of the Motor Vehicles Department (MVD) have gone green with 45 plug-in electric vehicles joining the enforcement squads of the newly created Safe Kerala project.
With another 20 electric vehicles (EVs) joining the squads within a week, all the 65 squads of Safe Kerala will have ‘plug-in electric vehicles’.
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The country’s own electric SUV, the Nexon EV from Tata Motors, was customised for enforcement activities. All gadgets for monitoring motor vehicles such as speed radars, breath analysers, and decibel meters are installed in the vehicles.
The newly procured vehicles had hit the road in the districts up to Thrissur and it will be on the roads round the clock, official sources said. In addition to the driver, there will be one MVD officer during daytime and two at night in these vehicles.
The MVD has emerged as a role model in ushering in green mobility. Going for EVs instead of fossil-fuelled vehicles is in tune with the government decision to all departments to hire EVs from April 1, 2020, instead of purchasing new diesel vehicles.
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The MVD will be able to mitigate approximately 650 tonnes of CO2 emissions and save on the costs of 2.2 lakh litres of high-speed diesel annually. As the vehicles run for 312 km in one charge, the exchequer can save considerable money as the per-km cost will be ₹1.
The EVs were being dry-leased for the next eight years from Energy Efficiency Services Ltd. (EESL), a Central government institution under the Ministry of Power, through the Agency for Non-Conventional Energy and Rural Technology (Anert).
An EV-charging network has also come up in the State with charging stations set up at 65 offices of the enforcement squads. The Transport Department is yet to take a call on giving access to the stations to the public.