- The project in collaboration with SK telecom was officially approved by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport following the deliberation in the Ministry of Environment's “Emissions Certification Committee”
- A total of 60 units, including Niro EV and Kona EV, proving the possible mitigation of about 150 tons of GHG yearly, compared to the internal combustion engine
- “e-Smartlink”, a total management solution dedicated to EV, playing a leading role in the project's approval
It boasts accurate data collection and storage functions in 75 areas such as battery, motor, charging, and vehicle.
- “Taking the lead in the eco-friendly mobility market, we will create and unlock diverse values in line with our Group’s Net-zero and ESG management policies”

SK rent-a-car obtained approval from the government on a project to lessen greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions with a shift toward electric vehicles (EVs), which is the first in Korea. While implementing the project, SK rent-a-car aims to create social values with electric cars, such as easing global warming. The company has taken the lead in creating the future eco-friendly mobility ecosystem by converting all its vehicles into environmentally friendly ones by 2030.

SK rent-a-car (CEO: Hwang Il-Moon) announced on January 19th this year that the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport officially approved its project to reduce vehicle fossil fuels and GHG emissions by introducing EVs at SK rent-a-car’s Jeju billycar branch. The company worked with SK telecom on this project and the approval came after the deliberation by the ‘Emissions Certification Committee’ operated by the Ministry of Environment.

The project has met all the government requirements concerning feasibility assessment and certification of the amount of mitigation. The project aims to switch some of its internal combustion engine (ICE) cars into EVs for persistent GHG reduction, which is verified to be quantifiable.

In order to calculate the estimated amount of reduction, the two companies monitored the amount of emissions from EVs and the equivalent level of ICEs over the past year, utilizing 60 units of Kia Niro EV and Hyundai Motor's Kona EV owned by SK rent-a-car Jeju billycar branch. And the result showed that around 150 tons of GHG emissions are expected to decrease yearly.

The two companies have secured ownership of the amount of GHG reduction, and the project is valid for ten years until January 2031. Going forward, SK rent-a-car will review various ways to broaden the scope of GHG mitigation business and provide customer benefits, thereby improving the group's ESG management performance.

In particular, SK rent-a-car has taken advantage of ‘e-Smartlink’, an electric vehicle version of its comprehensive automobile management solution called ‘Smartlink’, to secure accurate information on reduced GHGs.

‘e-Smartlink’ enables real-time remote monitoring for the calculation of GHGs reduced of vehicles as well as the collection and storage of 75 types of information, including 39 EV battery controls based on mileage, 17 motor controls, 11 charging controls, and eight vehicle-related ones. One of its features is to gather information regarding the amount of GHGs emitted, and the level of charge and discharge depending on the various driving propensities of drivers, which ensures high reliability of data.

SK telecom played the role of planning a mitigation project using IoT communication technology. It established a program to estimate the amount of reduction by analyzing vehicle information while transmitting the EV driving information, such as mileage and battery charging information collected through ‘e-Smartlink’, to ‘Cat. M1’, an IoT dedicated line.

An SK rent-a-car official said, “we have proven the possibility of a greenhouse gas reduction project using EVs for the first time in Korea through combining the capabilities and know-how of both companies. Starting from this project, we will take the lead in the eco-friendly mobility market and unlock diverse values in line with our Group’s Net-zero and ESG management policies.”

Meanwhile, SK rent-a-car participated in the ‘Korea’s 100 Conversion to Zero-emission Vehicle’ campaign hosted by the Ministry of Environment as well as the global initiative campaign, ‘EV100’ last year, declaring that it would convert about 200,000 vehicles that it owns to eco-friendly ones by 2030. As a stepping stone, SK rent-a-car announced in June last year that it will build the Jeju branch into an EV-exclusive complex equipped with 7,200 kW charging capacity and 3,000 EVs by 2025. It will become the largest one in Korea.

[Picture 1] SK rent-a-car CI