At the Northern Care Alliance NHS Foundation Trust (NCA), which runs hospitals and healthcare services in Oldham, Bury, Rochdale and Salford, sustainability is core to its operations. With modern technology becoming increasingly available, there is now more opportunities than ever for us to tackle its emissions and improve air quality.
The Trust which is based in Greater Manchester has teamed up with TRAILAR www.trailar.co.uk to innovate its fleet with their leading solar transport technology.
TRAILAR, based locally in Oldham, has been implemented across 13 vehicles its fleet network serving all four hospital sites.
More recently, it has been applied to two 7 tonne Iveco HGV laundry- vehicles utilised 6 days a week to fulfil laundry contracts and two Ford waste disposal vehicles used daily for internal local collections. Last year the Trust already took delivery of an all-electric Maxus ED3 patient-transport ambulance.
This technology allows the Trust to fit ultra-thin solar panels to new and existing vehicles and will actively reduce the fuel consumption, with solar energy powering all onboard electrical equipment including the tail lift which all the vehicles are heavily reliant upon.
TRAILAR’s technology captures and reports on all fuel and CO2 emission savings being made on each fitted vehicle allowing us to accurately gauge the benefits that Northern Care Alliance is receiving from solar.
Heidi Barnard, Group Head of Sustainability at the Northern Care Alliance NHS Foundation Trust said:
“We have been working with the team at TRAILAR, to innovate our transport fleet with their award-winning solar technology.
“This technology enables us to fit to new and existing diesel vehicles, and actively reduces the fuel consumption by reducing the vehicles alternators requirement to create electrical energy.
“With less fuel being burnt to create electrical energy to power onboard equipment, the emissions of the vehicle are also reduced. The solar technology also means that the vehicle no longer needs to idle its engine when making delivers to power the tail-lift, due to the new source of clean energy being utilised instead.
The TRAILAR Insights Platform will allow us to accurately gauge the benefit the NHS is obtaining from the solar.
“We are really pleased with the initial data, and look forward to seeing how the technology progresses as we move into the summer.”
About TRAILAR
TRAILAR is the global leader in solar solutions for transport, with thousands of systems fitted to customers in over 20 countries. Their mission is to drive the transport industry to a greener, more efficient future, through the use of solar and data driven technologies. Logistic solutions range from logistics with trucks, trailers, and delivery vans. All systems include IoT telematics as standard, allowing end users to see an array of vehicle performance data via the web-based TRAILAR Insights platform.