Today Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti announced the launch of the Climate Mayors’ Electric Vehicle Purchasing Collaborative, a program that will provide a turn-key, one-stop online procurement portal providing municipalities across the country equal access to competitively bid EVs and accompanying charging infrastructure. The Electrification Coalition will help act as the technical expert and support cities in their fleet transition planning — enabling a more efficient and rapid conversion of city fleets and charging infrastructure. By leveraging the collective buying power of the Climate Mayors, that represent 409 cities in 47 states, municipal fleets from every city will be able to reduce their acquisition costs, have access to experts from the EC and be able use a variety of financing options to accelerate the transition to an electric vehicle fleet.
To mark the launch and highlight the value of this new platform, 19 founding cities and two counties committed to purchase 376 electric vehicles in the next 12 months. Also known as “the Collaborative,” the program will help to rapidly transition city fleets to electrification, reducing oil use, lowering emissions and saving taxpayer dollars.
“Today’s announcement by Mayor Garcetti and the Climate Mayors will highlight the incredible market demand that exists from cities across the U.S. as they plan for an electric transportation future. By providing those with the right tools to make EV purchases and charging acquisition it will be more efficient and affordable for cities nationwide to make this shift. The EC believes the development of this Collaborative will be a catalyst to accelerate the transition of city fleets to EVs, reducing emissions, reducing our dependence on oil, and saving taxpayer money,” said Ben Prochazka, Vice President of the Electrification Coalition.
Visit www.DriveEVFleets.org to learn more about this program and explore the resources the EC has compiled to enable Collaborative accelerate EV adoption across the country. The EC’s expert partnership was made possible thanks to funding by America’s Pledge, an initiative bringing the private and public sectors together to ensure the U.S. delivers on the country’s ambitious goals of the Paris Climate Agreement. The America’s Pledge “Opportunity Agenda” will be formally released at the Global Climate Action Summit in San Francisco on September 12th.