ABSTRACT
Road transport in Britain consumes around 40 million tonnes of oil each year, or an astonishing 45.75 billion litres. Of this all but about 25,000 tonnes was, until recently, derived from fossil fuel that has been processed into petrol and diesel, together with a small amount of Liquid Petroleum Gas (LPG). These oil-based fuels may have become hugely convenient and relatively cheap but they fail to fulfil the basic aspirations of current environmental policy on three essential counts: • They are sourced from a non-renewable stock. • They produce harmful emissions. • Total reliance on these mineral oils contravenes an EU Directive that requires member states to utilise an increasing percentage of fuels from renewable sources.
