American electric scooter companies such as Bird and Lime are pushing their city-wide dockless scooter-sharing system as a green alternative to cars. Now, in the wake of one of the worst bushfire seasons we’ve seen, it feels like Australia isn’t doing a whole lot to solve our climate change problem. Half of the Great Barrier Reef has died since 2016, and it is not projected to live for more than a few decades at this rate due to factors caused by climate change. Additionally, recent spells of dry, hot weather have set up the perfect conditions for a devastating bushfire season. In the midst of it all, what can we do as Australians to help slow down the effects of climate change? More specifically, what role can electric scooters play in reducing the amount of pollution we produce?
One of the highest polluting sectors in Australia is transport. Transport accounts for about 17% of the carbon we produce, with cars constantly producing carbon dioxide and other harmful gases through their daily use. That’s why alternative forms of transport are becoming more and more popular as a means of reducing our carbon footprint. Electric scooters don’t produce any air pollution at all while running and are much cheaper to run. In comparison, an average car produces about 180.9 g of CO2 emissions per km travelled1, and Australians travelled about 12,600 km per year2 per vehicle on average. Multiply those together and we produce 2.3 tonnes of CO2 per year per car on the road. If you replace that with the zero emissions produced by using an electric scooter, even a single person can make a huge difference to how much pollution we make.
While not all of us can afford to completely stop using cars, by reducing how much we use them, we can still make a significant impact. Instead of making short 5-minute car trips to the station, or instead of driving to work, you could use an electric scooter and do your bit to help reduce Australia’s carbon footprint. It’s with small changes like these that we can make a big difference.
But the benefits don’t just end there: cars cost a lot of money in fuel, but electric scooters cost next to nothing to recharge. For example, you can find the Kugoo M2 Pro on our site on sale for only $799 (at the time of posting this) and recharging it costs somewhere in the cents. Compare that to roughly $20k for a car and $30-$50 for a fuel top up, and you’re saving a lot of money over time. It’s very easy to fit an electric scooter into your lifestyle, and it’s very rewarding.
With all that said, make sure you check your local state laws and that you comply with them before riding an electric scooter in public, as the specifics vary from state to state.