A year on from outlining our global sustainability commitments, our team at Uber Canada is doubling down on creating the right partnerships and frameworks to become a zero-emissions platform by 2040. 

Today we’re outlining some of the progress we’ve made to-date, and areas where we’ll continue to focus going into 2022. 

Helping drivers go electric

In a recent survey of drivers in Canada, we found that 71% are interested in switching to an EV. This is significant as we know that these drivers drive more than the average person, meaning every one that switches to an EV has an outsized impact on putting green kilometers on our streets.  But we also know that it can be challenging for drivers to make a big decision like transitioning to EV, so this month we launched an EV Calculator to help inform drivers on the cost of ownership, subsidies available, and local benefits when making the transition.

Another significant barrier to entry can be the access to charging in and around the city. With this insight in mind, we knew that focusing on charging infrastructure was a priority. Today, we announced a partnership with Greenlots, a member of the Shell Group (soon to become Shell Recharge Solutions in 2022) to create three new EV charging locations in Vancouver, British Columbia. Vancouver is currently one of the leading EV markets on Uber in North America, and this partnership will offer discounted charging rates to make public charging more affordable than charging at home. These charging stations will be exclusively for drivers and delivery people on Uber, and will open in January 2022. We hope this project will help to expand Vancouver’s EV charging infrastructure, and act as a pilot and a blueprint that can be replicated globally to make a great impact. 

Offering more ways to ride sustainably

Building a multimodal network on the app continues to be a priority for us, and can help promote green alternatives to personal cars. I’m proud of several initiatives we’ve done in this space this year:

  • Central to our efforts has been the continued expansion of Uber Green, our low-emissions ride option. This year we were able to expand Uber Green to 16 cities across the country, providing Canadians with a green option when booking a ride.
  • We collaborated with Lime so that their scooters and e-bikes are now integrated within the Uber app in North Vancouver, Ottawa and Edmonton, with the potential for more cities in the new year.
  • This month we went a step further with our work on Transit – we launched Uber + Transit in Ontario. In it’s pilot phase, Uber+Transit suggests convenient routes for users that include both an UberX ride to the closest transit stop, followed by instructions on how to get to the final destination using public transit. The feature is currently integrated within all public transit in the GTA, and we’ll be watching how it performs to understand how we can partner with transit in other cities to integrate within the app. 

Where next

Going green is truly a team sport, and we’ll continue to do our part at Uber to reach our sustainability targets. But we can’t do it alone. Progress towards a fully electric platform is best achieved in cities where we partner across the ecosystem, including with local governments who have prioritized a green recovery. These partnerships will continue to be vital in delivering our common goal for a cleaner, greener future.