ScotRail has begun trialling Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil (HVO) as an alternative to diesel in one of its Class 156 train units. The trial was initiated on 19 February, and is set to run for 12 weeks at the operator’s Corkerhill Depot, with testing carried out in partnership with Angel Trains and Crown Oil.
If successful, ScotRail plans to further investigate the use of HVO as a means to reduce greenhouse gases along railway lines throughout the country, utilising the alternative as a transitionary measure until such time as carbon-neutral fuel sources become more readily available.
Interesting in light of concerns about “greeness” of HVO production on BBC R4 Today this morning
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cm24n8nej94o
It uses PALM OIL – even when “second-hand”
Which is one of the products most grossly damaging to the environment on the planet.
Vast swathes of supposedly-protected jungle & forest are cleared for Palm Oil plantations, killing of hundreds of thousands of supposedly-protected species
We shouldn’t be using this stuff, at all.