Federal employees should travel by train and EVs, asks White House

The White House on Thursday has asked all of the federal employees to travel using electric vehicles (EVs) and public transportation services such as trains to reduce carbon emissions.

Brenda Mallory, White House Council on Environmental Quality Chairman, said that the move aims to “save taxpayers money, reduce emissions, strengthen our growing electric vehicle industry and create good-paying union jobs”.

Speaking of the past year, the US government employees spent 2.8 billion dollars on official travel. This includes 2.8 million flights, 2.3 million trips on rental vehicles, and 33,000 trips via trains.

These travels account for about 1.8% of the federal greenhouse gas emissions, says the White House.

Other than these, the Biden administration has announced to stop the purchase of gas-powered vehicles by 2035 and plans to adopt electric or plug-in light-duty vehicles by 2027.

To brief on its progress, the White House announced on Friday that the federal government has acquired 14,000 zero-emission vehicles and installed 5,500 charging ports to date. The federal government has expanded its EV purchases by 1% year on year.

In total, the government now has 650,000 vehicles and adding 50,000 vehicles annually.

Employees are told to rent EVs when the price is low or comparable to gas-powered vehicles. Also, the employees should use trains for trips less than 250 miles rather than airplanes.

In a directive manner, the government also asked employees to use rideshare for electric vehicles Lyft, Uber or taxis if available.

(source – Whitehouse)