Running Ribble Valley Council vehicles on vegetable oil ‘could slash emissions – but increase fuel bill by £97,000 a year’

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The council has bin lorries, vans, wagons, a tractor, a digger and six grass-mowing machines which could be converted to hydrotreated vegetable oil. In total, it has more 30 vehicles and machines in its fleet, including 12 bin lorries. Currently, the council’s two dog warden vans are electric powered. All the others use diesel.

Tests have been done by converting one bin lorry to use hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO). Now councillors are being asked to consider more options for the future.

The Community Services Committee deals with topics including bin lorries and collections, vehicles and grass cutting in parks and sports pitches.

A new report states: “The council’s vehicle fleet is the largest, single contributor to the authority’s carbon emissions.”

It adds: “In 2021, the council adopted a Climate Change Strategy for 2021 – 2030 and it has an ambition to become carbon-neutral by 2030. It also has a Climate Change Action Group which reviews the strategy with the council’s Economic Development Committee.”

The report says 10 Ribble Valley bin lorries are ‘Euro 6′ compliant and could run on HVO without any changes. Two bin lorries are not. Tests were carried out on one bin lorry using the vegetable oil. There were no issues and fuel consumption was similar to diesel. The council has also spoken to other councils which have switched to HVO and there have been no reported problems, the report adds. Changes to vehicle fuel tanks could be made at a Ribble Valley Council depot, if changes are agreed.

But the different cost of diesel and vegetable oil are an important consideration, the report points out.

It adds: “The current cost of diesel delivered to the depot is £1.19 per litre. The current cost of HVO is £1.69 per litre. Over the financial year of 2022-2023, the depot vehicles used 195,932 litres, with the cost of diesel being £233,159. For the same period, hydrotreated vegetable oil would have cost £331,125. The use of HVO as a vehicle fuel would increase the annual fuel budget at the depot by £97,966, which is a 42 per cent increase.”

Ribble Valley officers are recommending councillors on the Community Services Committee to submit a funding request to the borough’s Policy & Finance Committee, to allow all the suitable vehicles to be converted to the vegetable oil. This will have additional revenue implications of £100,000 a year and a one-off installation cost of £15,000.