Traffic commissioner (TC) Kevin Rooney has likened the use of AdBlue emulators on HGVs to fitting magnets to interfere with tachographs as the third haulier within a month was punished for cheating emission rules.
In Bristol, West of England TC Rooney disqualified Patrick McNally from being a transport manager for a year – having also lost his repute – after he admitted to researching the fitting of a defeat device.
His employer, Weston-super-Mare-based Mactrans, owned by Louis McNally, was described as a generally compliant business that had nevertheless stepped over the line with its use of a cheat device on one of its vehicles.
Its O-licence will be suspended for 14 days from 11 February. It was also given a three-month grace period by the TC to appoint a new transport manager to replace McNally.
In a second separate case, Rooney revoked the six-vehicle licence of Stephen Harris and Karen Phelps after rejecting Harris’s claim that he did not know that one of his vehicles was fitted with an emulation device.
Instead, Rooney took the view that Harris’s motivation for running with such a device fitted was so that he could travel into London and avoid the emissions charge for HGVs that are not Euro-5 compliant.
“I consider the fitting of the emulator as equivalent, for example, to using a magnet to interrupt a tachograph. Each is an act of fraud. Each can kill – one just does it more violently and quickly than the other,” said Rooney.
Last month, TC for the West Midlands Nick Denton revoked the licence of Stoke haulier Rapid Resource Deliveries after one of its vehicles was found to have an AdBlue emulator fitted.
The action comes after the DVSA found one in 12 vehicles it stopped between August and November last year were using emission fraud devices. Of 3,735 trucks stopped, 293 (8%) contained cheat devices such as AdBlue emulators, which prevent AdBlue systems from operating and increase vehicles’ NOx output.
