Green Ford Focus Fills Up At First Bioethanol Fuel Pumps

When bioethanol first went on public sale this morning, the Ford Focus Flexible Fuel Vehicle was front of the queue to be refuelled.

The Ford Focus Flexible Fuel Vehicle (FFV) is Britain's first biofuel car and can run on bioethanol or petrol in any mix in the same fuel tank. Bioethanol is a renewable fuel, on sale this month at 10 Morrisons supermarkets and priced cheaper than unleaded petrol from 84.9p a litre.

Five of the forecourts selling bioethanol are in Somerset, where Ford has sold the most Focus FFVs. The remainder are in East Anglia - three in Norfolk and two in Suffolk. Somerset and Norfolk are two of the counties where Ford is working with regional biofuel groups to establish FFV sales and bioethanol filling stations.

Andy Taylor, Ford's European sustainability director, said: "This is an important breakthrough for the Ford Focus FFV and the biofuel industry. Ford has been working with partners such as Morrisons for a year to make bioethanol publicly available. Together we have taken a vital next step towards encouraging more customers to consider buying Ford's biofuel cars."

The 1.8-litre Ford Focus FFV costs from £14,095 - in between the petrol-only 1.6 and 2.0-litre Focus models. CO2 emissions from bioethanol are almost cancelled out by the CO2 absorbed by the crops such as wheat and sugar beet used to make the sustainable fuel.