It’s long been our ambition to become the ‘greenest’ quarrying and concrete company in the UK and we’re excited to announce that as of this month, we may well have met this ambitious objective! Our on-site solar farms supply approximately 75% of the power we require to keep our production operations and support functions running all year around. Unfortunately solar panels are much less effective in the winter months, forcing us to source the balance of our annual electricity needs from other generators. We were delighted therefore when our energy brokers, Tritility, helped us to secure a new contract with Corona Energy to supply us with renewable electricity at a price that was competitive with that from traditional electricity generators. This means that as of the 1st November 2024, the entirety of our electricity needs come from renewable sources.
The storey doesn’t stop here! Due to the challenges associated with the electrification of mobile plant, we have traditionally been reliant on diesel to power the remainder of our production operations, as well as our fleet of tippers and concrete mixers. In support of our objective to become the greenest quarrying and concrete company in the UK, we have also made the decision this month to run all of our mobile plant and trucks on Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil, more commonly known as HVO fuel. HVO fuel is a direct replacement for regular diesel manufactured using vegetable raw materials, residues and waste products. Critically, it affords the opportunity to reduce our CO2 emissions by up to 90% where the operation of all our non-electric mobile plant, trucks and other vehicles is concerned.
Whilst HVO fuel is traditionally 10% – 20% more expensive than regular diesel, given its relatively limited supply, this difference is getting smaller as demand increases, and with this, the development of global HVO production. Our decision to make the swop now was undoubtedly helped by this trend, and more specifically, New Era Energy’s ability to supply us with sufficient fuel at a competitive price
In recognition of this, we have invested heavily in our own carbon offset programme, including a c. 1000 acre regenerative arable farm and the planting and management of c. 250,000 trees. Regenerative agriculture not only affords the opportunity to reduce direct carbon emissions, for example by no longer using a plough or power harrow to prepare the seed bed, but also store more carbon in our soils by protecting an inherently complex and fragile ecosystem. We have also created a significant bio-fuels operation to heat our operations, including the growing and processing of both Willow and Miscanthus.
