United Kingdom-based civil engineering contractor FM Conway has extended its use of hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) in its local and strategic highways operations, shifting away from diesel in its work to achieve net zero.
HVO is a synthetic biofuel made from re-used cooking oils and is completely fossil-free. It serves as a direct replacement for diesel and provides up to 90% CO2 savings as well as benefiting air quality through reduced nitrogen oxide and particulate matter emissions.
FM Conway projects the move will save around 3,000 tonnes of CO2e through to the end of the current financial year. In April, FM Conway will assess the feasibility of making a permanent switch to HVO.
The carbon savings from this investment are the equivalent of taking 60 heavy goods vehicles (HGVs) off the road for one year. While exploring longer-term solutions for the replacement of fossil fuels across the industry, HVO provides emission reductions and helps FM Conway and its clients reach their shared net zero ambitions.
The fuel will be supplied by New Era Energy, whose delivery trucks will also be powered by HVO, maximizing carbon savings across the supply chain. The sustainability of the product’s feedstock is accredited to the International Sustainability and Carbon Certification (ISCC), which supports climate-friendly supply chains. The traceability of feedstocks is also approved through Zemo Partnership’s Renewable Fuels Assurance Scheme (RFAS), which verifies companies’ claims on greenhouse gas emission savings and raw material sources for renewable fuels used in heavy-duty vehicles.
“We are already tackling embodied carbon through our pioneering material circularity approach, and this switch to HVO represents another step toward making CO2 savings and improving the air quality across all phases of the works we deliver,” says Matt Tallon, sustainability director at FM Conway.
“It supports our ethos of leading positive change in the infrastructure industry through experimentation and innovation,” adds Tallon. “Our self-delivery model allows us a greater degree of independence and flexibility with our operations, processes, products and fleet, giving us room to test different approaches and ultimately deliver benefits to our clients. The extended run of this trial, until April next year, will give our clients a taste of what’s available and achievable — and how they can use it to accelerate their own decarbonization journey.”
FM Conway recently secured British Standards Institute (BSI) PAS 2080:2030 certification for its management and reduction of whole-life carbon in infrastructure and the built environment.
