When ride hailing company Bolt set out to design its own shared scooter, part of a push into lightweight urban transit, engineers had one overarching goal: make it eco-friendly. The result, set to hit Europe’s streets en masse this spring, is a machine powered by electricity, that is 100 per cent recyclable and will last 60 months – an eon in the world of e-scooters.
Sandra Särav, Bolt’s head of sustainability, says the scooter is emblematic of a company-wide drive to counter climate change.
“There is no other way but to go to zero,” she says, referring to the need to offset greenhouse gas emissions. “All of us have a say in this and all of us are responsible for doing this.”
On 19 March, Digital Day 2021, Bolt joined 24 other technology companies in signing a pledge to develop “green digital solutions” that will help the world slash carbon dioxide emissions and digitally transform key economic sectors. Signatories, which include Microsoft, Ericsson and Vodafone, also committed to becoming carbon-neutral themselves by no later than 2040.
The pact, known as the European Green Digital Coalition, was spearheaded by the European Commission and endorsed by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
It comes with the world facing what experts warn is a looming climate crisis. The last decade has been the warmest on record and, scientists say, unless humanity dramatically reduces its greenhouse gas emissions, the Earth is facing a future of heat waves, food shortages and mass extinctions. Read more…
