Mr Patsy McGlone (Mid Ulster): To ask the Minister of Health, in light of increases in fuel costs, whether any assessment has been made of the benefits of using renewable sources to power all vehicles used by his Department and its arm’s-length bodies.
Minister of Health: My Department’s Arm’s-Length Bodies (ALBs) have previously been requested to develop an approach to enable the phasing out of fossil-fuel vehicles in health and social care fleets. The approach included consideration of alternative fuels such as Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil (HVO) as an interim lower carbon fuel and electricity.
A change to electric vehicles will be part of the organization’s fleet asset management plan taking account of the vehicle type and age, affordability, installed charging infrastructure for fleet and suitable electric vehicle availability. The use of HVO remains an option under consideration by ALBs in their existing diesel-powered fleet to support their climate change actions.
ENDS
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