Eco friendly buses spurred fuel savings worth Rs 70 Crore

Chennai, Jan 18 (UNI) Tamil Nadu Transport Minister K N Nehru has said that the induction of a new fleet of 6,000 eco-friendly buses into the state transport corporations has facilitated fuel savings to the tune of Rs 70 crore.

Giving this information while launching ''Oil and Gas Conservation Fortnight 2008'', organised by Public sector Oil companies and the Petroleum Conservation Research Association (PCRA) here last evening, Mr Nehru said more such environment friendly buses would be introduced in the coming months.

The eco-friendly buses, besides being pollution free, helped the corporations to save fuel and money, he said.

Stating that the state transport corporations were operating 19,000 strong fleet, catering to 1.8 crore passengers every day, he said as a result of fuel efficiency drive, the average mileage of the fleet increased to 5.3 km per litre of diesel.

Thanks to sensitisation of drivers and conductors on fuel saving, the fleet in most of the depots in the state recorded a mileage in the range of 4.94 km to 5.21 km per litre of diesel, he said.

The measures started yeilding rich dividends as the corporations were saving a whopping Rs 79 lakhs a day, Mr Nehru said.

He said the success came after the government launched the fuel efficiency measures and sensitised the drivers and conductors on the need to save fuel through hoardings and incentives.

Given the magnitude of fuel expenditure, even a five per cent saving through fuel efficiency measures would mean a substantial amount of money which could be diverted for development, Mr M Nageswaran, General Manager, Indian Oil Corporation (Souther Region) said.

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