Ride-hailing company Lyft announced Thursday that it is adding 14 cities and counties to its “Green” mode, which allows riders to request a hybrid or electric vehicle.
Currently available in Portland, Oregon, the service will launch in new markets including Austin, Texas; Washington, D.C.; Boston; Chicago; Denver; New York; Phoenix; Seattle; and Los Angeles, Orange County, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco and the region known as Silicon Valley in California.
The option will roll out to those markets “over the course of the coming weeks,” beginning April 17, according to a Lyft spokesperson. At first, only riders with a Lyft business profile and a work email address in these areas will be eligible, according to the announcement.
“We’ve seen an explosion of interest in EVs — and once a driver or rider gets into an EV, they’re more likely to prefer them moving forward,” said Paul Augustine, Lyft’s director of sustainability, in a blog post. “By rolling out ‘Green’ across the country, we can nudge riders to take more sustainable forms of travel, helping us reach our shared climate goals sooner and ultimately reducing our carbon footprint faster.”
Lyft has committed to going all-electric by 2030. The company makes electric vehicles available to drivers who rent vehicles from Lyft and provides discounts and rebates for home charging equipment and for the use of public charging stations.
Uber, which set a goal of 100% zero-emission rides by 2030 in the U.S. and Canada, recently announced an agreement with bp to provide EV charging discounts for its ride-hailing drivers at bp pulse fast-charging stations globally.
