French Mompreneur Offers Motorists Chance To Drive Green

China View:

Electric, hybrid, LPG, or biofuel-propelled cars… the green car market is booming as more and more people in France and around the world become aware of the adverse effects of fossil fuels on the environment.

The situation has been complicated further by the current specter of high crude oil prices. “Due to high fuel prices, people are being forced to take a second look at how they move from one place to another,” according to a Paris-based car dealer. “Fuel efficiency has become the buzz word.”

And in a move that just goes to show the extent of the ongoing craze, a French entrepreneur has moved on and launched a website www.2et4rouesvertes.com, which will be the first free site for advertising environmental friendly vehicles.

The idea of establishing such a site sprouted in the head of Claire Bertin, a 31 year-old mother, who had tried in vain to hire an electric car for her personal use. “I quickly learnt that it was not easy to find one on the Internet,” she says.

The young woman has a long experience of working in a Paris-based car rental. Soon, she hired a webmaster to set up her site discreetly and as quickly as possible for fear of “the idea falling in the wrong hands.”

In order to do this, the resident of Taillan-Medoc, a Paris suburb, approached the government and was given assistance through the Assedic mechanism set up to help budding entrepreneurs. The site opened three months ago and Bertin has set aside between 2 and 3 hours of her time daily to update it.

“I go through the classified pages of other media, especially the mainstream ones, in order to attract ads to my site,” says the mother of two. The selection is strict. “I exclude all vehicles running on petrol or diesel,” she says.