Mini cleanest in the UK

by Vijay Pattni

Mini is the cleanest car company in the UK – ahead of Fiat, Peugeot and Toyota.

Mini topped the table with an average of 138g per km of carbon emissions during the first three months of 2008, compared to 139g/km for Fiat, and 146g/km for Toyota.

And Mini, which is owned by BMW, slashed its carbon emissions across all models by nearly 11 per cent from 2007. Toyota managed to reduce its CO2 levels by 2 per cent.

Clean Green Cars surveyed the UK’s car industry and revealed a 2.7 per cent overall reduction in CO2 emissions during the first three months of 2008 – which is double the improvement from 2007.

The survey also found four of the top five most improved models came from BMW – including the BMW 6 Series, BMW 5 Series, and BMW 1 Series.

Clean Green Cars spokesperson Jay Nagley said: “It is no coincidence that BMW and Mazda both score well – they have taken concrete measures in the last 12 months to improve the environmental performance of their cars.

“While all manufacturers talk about environmental improvements, there are plenty who have improved by less than one per cent in the last 12 months. These tables show what is possible – and demonstrate there is no excuse for inaction.”

The top ten most improved cars are:

BMW 6 Series – 19.42 per cent cleaner
BMW 5 Series – 15.74 per cent cleaner
BMW 1 Series – 14.42 per cent cleaner
Mazda 2 – 13.10 per cent cleaner
Mini – 10.77 per cent cleaner
Mazda 6 – 9.68 per cent cleaner
Volvo C70 – 8.91 per cent cleaner
BMW 3 Series – 8.67 per cent cleaner
BMW X3 – 8.27 per cent cleaner
Audi A4 – 8.21 per cent cleaner

We've rounded up the cars which emit less than 120g/km of CO2 - beating the London congestion charge.

BMW recently came top in a 'green' survey - have your say on the Auto Trader Blog