Ken changes his mind - again?

Ken Livingstone has confirmed that the London Congestion Charge will in future exempt cars emitting less than 120g/km of C02. Although this is in line with the original thinking for revising the scheme, most recent reports had suggested that the proposed exemption would be dropped because of the large numbers of cars that were expected to sneak in under the limit.

Lots of the car-makers have put out press releases trumpeting which models in their ranges will be exempt. Renault claims that 31 models in its range will be CC free. Apart from Lexus' hybrids, which continue to enjoy the exemption as well, I think the classiest car to slip through is BMW's 118d - not the last word in prestige and luxury, but hardly the sort of hair-shirted economy motor Ken probably had in mind when he first thought of the exemption either.

Great spots 7 - hybrid Ikea company car

A month or two back, Ikea made a bit of a splash in the national press when it announced that it was switching its fleet of company cars from diesels to hybrids.


I spotted one of these recently in the car park at Ikea's store near Leeds - interestingly enough, it's a Honda, rather than the more common Toyota Prius.


I heard a whisper that IKEA's fleet only contains about a dozen cars, so perhaps the impact of this move is going to be limited. However, I did notice that IKEA has switched almost all of the light bulbs on sale in its stores over to the long-life energy-saving type, so perhaps this is more than just corporate greenwash.