Government gives £1m funding for retrofit solutions

Almost £1m of funding has been committed by the government to support three vehicle retrofit technology suppliers.

The three technology suppliers are Eminox, Proventia and Baumot. The money is to be used to accredit technologies for cutting polluting emissions from a wider range of vehicle types. The projects to be brought about by the funding are to seek to bring accredited retrofit solutions to the market for applications of 17 coaches, 12 trucks, one taxi and one refuse collection vehicle, as well as seven more bus engines. The £971,544 is to be awarded over the financial years of 2018/19 and 2019/20. The funding is being awarded under the Clean Vehicle Retrofit Accreditation Scheme (CVRAS), which was developed by the LowCVP and Energy Saving Trust.

LowCVP’s MD, Andy Eastlake, said: “We need a range of policy tools to tackle the urgent problems associated with air pollution. Adopting electric vehicles or changing to the latest clean new trucks and buses needs to be in operators’ longer-term plans, but we also need more immediate options to deliver cleaner air in the shortest time possible. Developing robust retrofit solutions for ‘hard-to-tackle’ vehicles is an expensive business and this funding will help bring more fully accredited solutions to the market.

“I’m delighted to see these new solutions in the pipeline and would reiterate that operators must use accredited systems only to meet CAZ requirements. They should not be tempted by a non-approved product; if it looks too good to be true, it probably is!”