What Car? Green Car of the year

The Volvo S40 DRIVe beat the BMW 118d and the Renault Megane to the top spot in the Small Family category and then stormed ahead to achieve victory over all the other category winners, including the Audi A8 and MINI Cooper S, to be awarded the prestigious overall What Car? Green Car of the Year title.

Offering exceptionally low CO₂ emissions of just 104g/km and returning up to 72.4 mpg on the combined cycle, What Car?'s judges praised the S40 DRIVe's unique combination of low emissions, practicality, safety and driver enjoyment as key reasons for the win.

The overall What Car? Green Car of the Year title was handed to Stuart Kerr, Regional President of Europe, Volvo Car Corporation by the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson and Steve Fowler, editor of What Car? The category win for the What Car? Green Small Family Car of the Year was presented to Volvo Car UK’s Managing Director, Peter Rask.

Steve Fowler, What Car’s editor, heaped praise on the car. He said: “Volvo’s S40 DRIVe is one seriously appealing eco-friendly car. Its low emissions don’t come at the expense of quality, safety or driver enjoyment and it’s great value, too. It’s everything we look for in a Green Car of the Year.”

Upon receiving the award, Stuart Kerr said: “Volvo has a strong commitment to its environmental activities and we have worked hard to reduce the carbon footprint on all our cars by focusing on health, resource utilisation and the ecological consequences right through from production, use to disposal.

"The recent launch of the DRIVe range enables Volvo to offer mid-sized cars with the same fuel consumption and CO₂ emissions as competitor's small cars. For customers, this means that they don't have to compromise on anything when they choose a Volvo.  This highly important award is recognition of Volvo's desire to build the most fuel efficient cars possible," he concluded.