Rachel Gallard

The French postal service (La Poste) is testing electric cars to replace traditional petrol ones. The tests are starting in Brest and Rennes in Brittany with 22 new cars. The aim is to eventually have 8,100 electric vehicles out of a total fleet of 29,000 by 2025

The 100,000 or so postal workers in France travel some 760 million kilometers a year, on foot, by bicycle, scooter, or car, and since 2010, also on an electric quad bike called the Quadéo.

French yellow mail box

As driving an electric car is incredibly easy, postmen and postwomen only get a short training course of 15 minutes. The main difference is that they need to get used to the two pedals, the accelerator, and the brake, instead of changing gears, as there are no gears to worry about! The staff who have already tried the cars are amazed by how quiet they are.

At the moment, an electric car can only do about 100 km and the recharge requires 3h30 on a standard plug, so it can’t be used in rural areas.

Each car will save 3 tons of CO2 per year and per car.

Other French companies have followed this environmentally friendly idea and have ordered altogether 50,000 cars for the future.

Who knows? We will all be driving an electric car soon!

Please help us!

If you found this useful, please let your friends know by sharing it here...