Red Diesel

In times of economic uncertainty, each penny counts. Everyone wants to stay in the black, not the red - everyone except Aylesbury Town Council. However, this is one situation where being in the red is a shrewd cost saving move, not an expense; we've made the switch to red diesel!

In the UK all fuel sold attracts duty - a tax paid to central government. Everyone notices the affect of fuel duty following the annual budget when changes are reflected in fluctuating pump prices. However, fuel duty is not universal and different types of fuel attract different levels of duty depending on their future use.

Red Diesel is a intended primarily for off road agricultural or construction uses and as such attracts a much lower duty. It's just like regular diesel you get from the pump, except a chemical solvent dye is added into the fuel to distinguish it from its higher duty counterpart.

In January of 2011, Aylesbury Town Council swapped expensive white diesel, for economic red diesel. With over half of our vehicle fleet eligible to fill up on red, it makes sound fiscal sense. The annual fuel bill has been cut almost in half saving us hundreds of pounds.

Robert Taft, Outdoor Supervisor for Aylesbury Town Council, was very pleased with the change, 'Coming from an agricultural background, I knew using the red in our fleet was the right thing to do,' he commented, concluding, 'the final results will be very positive for the people of Aylesbury,'

Aylesbury Town Council's Project Officer, Daniel Parslow, who led the research, was in agreement, adding, 'This is one step in a much larger energy procurement plan. With increasing uncertainty in the fuel market anything we can do to cut costs and promote stability for us is a sound move. Our next stage will be bio-diesel, and we’re very excited.'

Bio-Diesel
Using a relatively simple chemical process controlled by specialised equipment, used cooking oil can be transformed into fuel usable in diesel engines. Self produced bio-diesel is clean, green, and cheaper than diesel from the pump. It forms the next step in Aylesbury Town Council’s energy management plans. This is where we need your help. If you are an organisation or business who produces waste vegetable oil, we’d like to hear from you. By supplying Aylesbury Town Council with your old cooking oil, you’d be helping us to save the environment, and the tax payer. Please contact us if you can help.

How Red Diesel is Made
1. Plants and animals, which died millions of years ago, are subjected to intense pressure and heat underground turning their remains into crude oil.

2. Also known as petroleum, crude oil is extracted from the earth using oil rigs and pumping wells before being barrelled up and transported around the world to refineries using massive oil tankers and long pipelines.

3. The refineries then fractionally distil the crude oil under incredibly high temperature and pressure. Lighter fractions of the distilled crude oil boil off first, with heavier fractions taking longer. Petrol evaporates at around 150oC while Diesel requires temperatures around 300oC. Heavier fractions are often chemically cracked into other useful products such as paraffin wax and lubricating oils.

4. A red solvent dye is added as a chemical marker to the red diesel allowing the government to distinguish it from regular white diesel and attach appropriate fuel duties.

5. The red diesel is transported to various distributors across the world who then sell it on to consumers like Aylesbury Town Council, putting it to use in their equipment and machinery.