Date published: 01.09.08 - not release date

MORE TH>N Pioneers Eco Friendly 'Green Driving Technology'

MORE TH>N Car Insurance has launched a revolutionary new insurance scheme that uses Formula 1-style in-car telemetry to help British motorists drive in a greener, more efficient and economical way.

The innovative new service, called Green Wheels, helps drivers understand how their driving style affects the environment by giving them access to information such as their rate of acceleration, braking and the number of short journeys they make. By doing this, MORE TH>N hopes to help change the way drivers behave behind the wheel and lower the carbon footprint of the 31m cars on Britains roads.

To bring Green Wheels to life, MORE TH>N has adopted new ‘Green Box’ technology; a small device that hooks up to the vehicle’s Engine Management System and reads the motorist’s driving style. The Green Box then sends that information wirelessly to MORE TH>N’s new website, https://greenwheels.morethan.com where drivers can confidentially access personalised reports on their driving style to help improve their “eco-driving”.

Motorists’ driving styles are then rated on an easy-to-understand A to G scale, much the same as the scales used to rate everyday appliances like washing machines or dishwashers, where ‘A’ indicates an energy efficient style and a ‘G’ rated driver is less efficient or rather more polluting. Users can get a deeper understanding of their driving by accessing the numerous graphs and summary sheets, which provide greater guidance of what they can do behind the wheel to improve their rating.

Dowshan Humzah, Product Director at MORE TH>N, commented: “Green Wheels is great news for anyone interested in taking more responsibility for their own carbon ‘tyre-print’.

“Furthermore, by helping motorists drive more efficiently the ‘Green Box’ can also help cut the cost of motoring which, with fuel prices rising, is top of many motorists' agendas.”

The ground-breaking ‘green box’ forms part of MORE TH>N’s commitment to the ‘Together’ campaign; a coalition of major UK companies committed to providing their customers with quick and easy things they can do to help fight climate change. To find out more visit www.together.com.

Dowshan Humzah continued: “We are delighted to be the only insurer invited to join Together and to be the 1st in the UK to become carbon neutral, Green Wheels is the next in a series of initiatives we have developed to play our part in reducing damage to the environment."

David Hall, Campaign Director of Together said: “Together is about the easy things people can do to fight climate change. This innovative product is a great first step for drivers who want to learn about and manage the impact their car has on the environment.”

For green driving tips or to find out more log-on on to http://www.morethan.com/Pages/Products/Car/GreenWheels_Home.... or call 0800 975 3572.


For further info:

Nick Dear
MORE TH>N External Communications
Phone: 020 7337 5602
M: 07824 839 511
E: nick.dear@uk.rsagroup.com

Carmel McCarthy
MORE TH>N External Communications
Phone: 020 7337 5405
M: 07717 294529
E: carmel.mccarthy@uk.rsagroup.com

Notes to Editors:

MORE TH>N is the direct financial services arm of RSA. It offers motor, home, pet, life and travel insurance by phone and via the internet. It also offers shop, office, business car, hotels, property, club ,contractor and van insurance direct to small businesses.

In December 2006 MORE TH>N, together with its parent company RSA, became the 1st insurer in the UK to be carbon neutral. The company has cut its carbon footprint by over half since 2000 and has offset the remainder by purchasing voluntary carbon reductions.

About Together:

'Together’ (www.together.com) is a consumer engagement campaign which helps UK households reduce CO2 emissions by one tonne over three years.

Many of the UK's favourite brands are united behind the campaign to provide millions of customers with a growing range of new products and ideas that make it easier or more affordable to reduce their CO2 emissions.

Campaign partners include B&Q, Barclaycard, British Gas, BSkyB, Marks & Spencer, More Th>n RSA, National Express, O2 and Tesco. The campaign is also supported by The Mayor of London, The Church of England, the Energy Saving Trust, Defra, the National Consumer Council, Live Earth and Stop Climate Chaos.

Initiatives are detailed on www.together.com where the collective reduction in emissions is calculated based on partner sales data. The campaign was launched in 2007 and has been endorsed by former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair and former US Vice-President Al Gore.

About Airmax:

The Airmax Group, formed in April 2005, is a privately owned company based in Verwood-Dorset, Birmingham and Holland. The Group specialises in remote asset management, driver profiling and Eco fleet solutions for Leasing Companies, End User Fleets and, increasingly, large organizations within the Finance and insurance sectors.

The team at Airmax has more than 180 years combined experience and industry knowledge in developing hardware design, hosted and client based solutions. Our focus has increasingly been on the use of intelligent data generated by vehicles in a range of customer specific value added services.

Prominent among the latest developments are remote vehicle diagnostics, where vehicle faults are detected as soon as they begin to register via the vehicle CAN and flagged up within the fleet management system; together with the remote ‘remapping’ of engine ECU’s for increased fuel economy and CO2 reduction.

MORE TH>N is a registered trademark of the Royal & Sun Alliance Insurance Group plc and a trading style of Royal & Sun Alliance Insurance plc (No.93792). Registered in England & Wales at St.Mark’s Court, Chart Way, Horsham, RH12 1XL. Authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority.