When the cameraman and I got into the car with Stockholm driving school instructor Lars Rembjer and his student Sofia to film our Ecodriving story, I didn’t know what to expect.But being environmentally aware and owning a biofuel car myself, I was of course very interested and saw this as an opportunity to learn as well as doing my job.

“Put a gear in, release the handbrake and perhaps have a look around you. Then you start the engine,” was the first thing Rembjer told his student. During the next hour and a half, we were all given an Ecodriving lesson on the not so busy Stockholm streets.

He made it sound very simple. Use the engine to slow the vehicle before hitting the brakes, drive in as high a gear as possible, try to avoid aggressive acceleration from a standing start and only overtake when necessary.

When I got home that evening and took the car to the grocery store I tried to apply what I had learned to my own driving. That’s when I realised just how deeply ingrained and automatic most actions are when one has been driving for a long time.

Even as I made a mental note to myself that I should make the preparations before turning on the engine, before I knew it I had done it in my usual way.
I thought the engine sounded weird when driving in third gear in a 30 km zone and Rembjer would be horrified at my excessive use of the brakes.

But it’s a start and I know that from now on I will always try to drive in a more environmentally friendly way. I have also been telling friends and family about it so hopefully it will make a difference. Above all, it makes perfect sense.

The approximately 10 seconds the car isn’t running when you make the simple preparations don’t sound like much. But when imagining how many times we all do it every day, every week, year - it’s the obvious way forward in our efforts to reduce CO2 emissions!