How to consume less fuel? MILE21 guides you

The Mile21 project aims at providing consumers with the information they need so they are part of the solution to limit car emissions. How so? By providing them with an online tool that compares cars across the market. The tool also allows users to keep track of their own fuel use and helps them identify ways to limit their fuel cost and emission consumption level. The project was launched three years ago by Euroconsumers’ members –Test Achats/Test-Ankoop, Altroconsumo, DECO PROTESTE and Organización de Consumidores y Usuarios (OCU)– together with the Greek Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, the Greek Emisia SA, the German International Council on Clean Transportation, and the Dutch Organisation for Applied Scientific Research.

A PROJECT THAT EMPOWERS CONSUMERS WITH INFORMATION

The first aim of the MILE21 project echoes the philosophy of Euroconsumers’ Approved by Tomorrow manifesto. Both stand for robust information to be provided to consumers in order to enable and empower them to choose the most sustainable options: No shaming and blaming, but real guidance and real solutions. Its sole name says a lot about it, as MILE21 stands for ‘More information less emissions, empowering consumers for a greener 21st century’. The MILE21 platform allows consumers to look up and compare the real fuel consumption and emission values among a wide range of car models sold in the EU or their own country. It also offers the opportunity to keep track of the user’s own fuel use so that they can make an enlightened decision based on that information.

A PROJECT THAT STRIVES FOR SUSTAINABILITY

The project bets on consumers’ ability to act for the planet as long as they have the necessary data. It therefore aims at nudging consumers’ behaviour so that car manufacturers are pushed to increase the production of green cars rather than those with a nocive effect on the environment. Another great feature of the project which could be beneficial to our planet is the possibility to keep track of consumers fuel use and to build on that to provide strategic advice on how to limit it. If more people drive more consciously and succeed in consuming less fuel, the global environmental impact would be significant.

AN INNOVATIVE WAY OF GATHERING KEY DATA TO POWER SUSTAINABILITY

This project is also committed to contributing to the collection of robust large-scale monitoring data which can provide sustainability stakeholders with precious information to advance their environmentally-friendly purposes. Thanks to direct involvement of consumers as well as the vehicle tests carried out on the road, MILE21 supports voluntary contribution to the collection of real-world fuel consumption data. It does so by:

• Compiling detailed information on cars’ fuel consumption and tailpipe emission;
• Comparing real-world fuel consumption values of new and older car models sold in the EU;
• Providing drivers with the necessary data to monitor their cars’ fuel consumption and encouraging them to make their real-world figures available to the public.

All data collected is anonymous and doesn’t allow individual identification.

MILE21 PROJECT: AN EYE-OPENER AND EFFICIENT TOOL

For analysis purposes, five anonymous regular users of MILE21 were randomly selected. The results showed that after activation of their green driving advice, all five users got a reduction in fuel consumption ranging from 2 to 9%. Such tests also confirmed that the fuel consumption level estimated by MILE21 is in line with the ones declared by users. Most importantly: in all cases, the consumption level declared by car manufacturers tends to always be lower than what reality shows. Such data reiterates the interest for consumers to use a tool based on genuine data to effectively evaluate a car’s fuel consumption.

Interested? Give it a try and join the community of fuel savers!

If you have a car, or plan to buy one, and want to save some of your fuel for economic or environmental reasons, MILE21 is a good starting point. The intuitive platform and limited data needed to obtain valuable information make it a particularly user-friendly tool. A new QR code feature allowing to directly reach the refuelling MILE21 page with a smartphone further increases the efficiency of the platform. The process takes easy steps:

Track

After registering, you’ll be asked to indicate your car and make three total refuels to start to estimate your average consumption. After three total refuels,  MILE21 will be able to calculate your own fuel consumption.

Compare

You’ll then be provided with the opportunity to compare your own consumption with the value declared by the manufacturer and the one generated by MILE21. If it is higher than MILE21’s estimate, you will be given key insights to help you reduce it.

Improve and save

This last section is filled with clear and easy-to-read strategic advice to reach your full green driving potential and start your fuel savings!

Find a green car

Last but not least, a whole well-documented and comprehensive section entitled ‘Find a green car’ is dedicated to a benchmark of an incredible number of cars according to environmental criteria. The best tool on the net for someone searching for a new green car.

THE GREAT POTENTIAL OF MILE21

A project that makes the most of its resources

The MILE21 is a project which is funded by the Life/programme of the European Union agreement number LIFE17 GIC/GR/000128. Seeking such funding enables Euroconsumers’ ambition to increase its member organisations’ impact to best represent consumers.

MILE21: The next best website for a ‘Better world’?

Willing to take the most of those valued resources, Euroconsumers members and their MILE21 partners have put a lot of energy into the project and got it nominated in the ‘Better World’ category of the EU Web awards 2021. Anyone can vote for MILE21 via a simple click in the Nominees section of the EU Web Awards 2021 site by 5 August in order to take the project to the next level and help this useful and environmentally-friendly project increase its reach.

AN AMBITIOUS PROJECT WITH A MESSAGE THAT NEEDS TO BE WIDESPREAD

Euroconsumers and its members Test Achats/Test Ankoop, Altroconsumo, DECO PROTESTE and OCU are eager to see this promising project reach a broader audience of consumers. The MILE21 project already counts more than 5.000 registered users andalmost 6.000 registered cars. The green transition cannot happen without more widespread  involvement of consumers across the EU. The MILE21 project could help a great deal to allow consumers to increase their positive impact on the environment!