Lobby group the CBI has called on the Government to further reform vehicle excise duty to encourage the uptake of more low-carbon vehicles.

It claims more fiscal incentives are crucial to help business meet ambitious carbon reduction targets.

“Technological innovation has the potential to deliver substantial reductions in carbon emissions across the road vehicle sector,” explained the CBI’s director of business environment Dr Neil Bentley at the Low Carbon Vehicle Partnership annual conference in London.

“To meet our long term reduction targets we are going to need more alternative engines, plug-in hybrids, more fully electric cars and vans and they will need to be commonly available.”

He praised public procurement, such as the Mayor of London’s electric vehicle delivery plan, which will see 1,000 electric vehicles on the GLA fleet by 2015.

“This sort of public procurement is the sort of leadership we want to see from central Government,” added Bentley.

The CBI is also keen that road pricing aimed at reducing congestion should be considered.

Bentley explained: “Recent research from the CBI said road pricing could be an effective tool.

“We know that in Australia this not only reduced congestion in Sydney, but also road transport emissions in the city by 17%.”