The HVO is said to be low odour, also reducing greenhouse gas emissions by around 90% over regular fuel, and removing around 800 tonnes of CO2-equivalent per year from the council’s daily operations.
Travelling around 400,000 miles a year, the fleet includes 24 freighters that empty around 55,000 domestic bins weekly, and vans and other vehicles used for other functions and fleet support.
Council leader Richard Wright said: “Our vehicles travel along every road in the district, servicing every home, clearing fly tipping and undertaking other vital environmental tasks right across the area. Now as they do so, there will be greatly reduced atmospheric impact as climate damaging emissions direct from the exhausts will be 98% lower from vehicles using HVO over regular diesel.”
‘The net emissions we’ve been striving for’
Taking into account the whole supply chain of the HVO and averaging across the entire fleet which still includes some limited regular diesel use, the council has said the emissions reduction is expected to be near 90%.
Wright added: “In keeping with the entire ethos of waste minimisation, repurposing and recycling, the HVO is itself the product of recycling, as the oils that are converted into the fuel have already been used for the purpose they were grown for and re-collected for secondary use.
“Although HVO is currently more expensive than fossil diesel due to production costs and material sourcing, it offers the significant reduction in net emissions we have been striving for, without the huge cost of replacing our existing vehicles.”
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