Green dream for Fix Auto Penzance

Fix Auto Penzance is on course to become one of the first vehicle repair centres in the south west to be carbon neutral.

Owner Stuart Cameron’s business was awarded the NBRA’s Green Bodyshop of the Year Award in 2019 following a programme of investment that included establishing a 30KW bank of solar panels to power his unit, converting his lighting to LEDs and implementing significant recycling measures.

His goal now is to operate a business making no net release of carbon dioxide and believes that more organisations will stipulate that their suppliers will have to demonstrate their green credentials in the future.

Therefore, he has employed ECA Business Energy, specialists in managing the process to become carbon neutral working towards the PAS 2060 standard given out by the British Standards Institution (BSI).

He said: “I’m no eco or green campaigner but I feel we all owe it to ourselves and our families for future generations to do as much as we can for the environment. While I didn’t fully understand the environmental benefits at the time, we started investing in environmentally friendly measures four years ago and increased our recycling of materials mainly to try and reduce our operational costs.

“Now I know the environmental benefits I am totally committed to becoming fully carbon neutral.”

He added: “A repair centre like ours isn’t the most environmentally friendly of businesses. We use a lot of electricity, gas and oil to power the bodyshop and spraybooths. While I’ve installed solar panels to supply electricity, I’m now looking into the possibilities of converting to bio-fuel for the booths and using electric vehicles for our courtesy cars.

“As far as I’m concerned, running a carbon-neutral business is inevitably going to be the future.”