The Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation (RTFO) supports the government’s policy on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles by encouraging the production of biofuels that don’t damage the environment.

Under the RTFO suppliers of transport and non road mobile machinery (NRMM) fuel in the UK must be able to show that a percentage of the fuel they supply comes from renewable and sustainable sources. Fuel suppliers who supply at least 450,000 litres of fuel a year are affected. This includes suppliers of biofuels as well as suppliers of fossil fuel.

RTFO guidance

The Department for Transport publishes guidance on the RTFO legislation. This provides support for fuel suppliers, independent verifiers and others involved in the supply of biofuels for use in road transport in the UK.

This guidance is divided into 3 main parts:

• process guidance, which explains how the scheme works and what suppliers need to do to comply
• carbon and sustainability guidance, which explains how suppliers should meet the sustainability criteria for biofuels
• guidance for verifiers

There are also a number of supporting documents, and a short summary guidance document aimed at smaller companies which supply biofuels from used cooking oil only.

Carbon calculator

The carbon calculator is a standalone programme that allows users to assess the greenhouse gas savings from a given batch of biofuels. I can be used to generate reports to upload to the RTFO reporting system.