A trio of major car rental companies is enticing ecologically conscious customers by marketing carbon offsets as part of their offerings. The offsets fund clean energy and other projects that result in measurable reductions in carbon emissions.
Enterprise Rent-A-Car, National Car Rental and Alamo Rent A Car recently started giving people an option to pay $1.25 per rental to buy the offsets. The program was prompted by persistent consumer inquiries on what to do to offset the impact of the emissions from their car rentals, according to Enterprise Rent-A-Car spokeswoman Lisa Martini.
“We’ve investigated it for a while and decided to take an opportunity with it,” said Martini. “It’s actually part of our environmental platform.”
Consumer response to the promotion has been strong, with 1,000 customers a day opting to buy the carbon offsets during the first several days of the program. The companies are working with TerraPass, which funds carbon offset projects. TerraPass estimates that 100,000 consumers buying the offsets translate into offsetting more than 30 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions.
The three rental companies, owned by the Taylor family of St. Louis, will match customers’ carbon offset purchases up to $1 million.
The Taylors’ green platform includes 440,000 cars with fuel efficiency ratings of 28 miles per gallon or better and 237,000 at 32 mpg or better in a fleet of 1.1 million vehicles between the three companies. More than 73,000 of their cars now burn ethanol.
Last year, the Taylors committed $25 million to create the Institute for Renewable Fuels. Its charitable foundation is spending $50 million to plant 50 million trees over the next 50 years.
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