Tax on JETA1

[Pielander]

Some people in Tech Log were discussing the development of diesel engines for piston engine a/c. With diesel being very similar to jet fuel, which is not currently taxed, this raises the possibility of running piston engines off JETA1 and saving lots of £££.

Does anybody know what the regulations are for purchasing jet fuel tax-free? I did a university project on an APU, and we had to have a meter on the tank so that Customs & Excise could monitor what we were using and make sure that nobody was syphoning it off for private use. This suggests to me that the situation is not as simple as "no tax on jet fuel". There are two interesting points to this:

1. Possibility of cheaper training & GA flying due to substantially lower fuel costs.

2. Possibility of running a <slightly modified> diesel car on jet fuel and also saving £££'s

Comments welcomed :)

Pie

[Squawk 8888]

It's easier than that. Home heating oil is diesel oil, only difference is that diesel fuel is dyed to show that the tax was paid. Lots of Canucks use this trick- when they converted their homes to gas they kept the oil tank and use it for their cars. The savings quite substantial- diesel is >60 cents/L while heating oil is ~30 cents. The entire difference is tax.

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Per dementia ad astra

[Dan Winterland]

Your diesel car will run on most oil based fuels (as opposed to spirit based - i.e. petroleum, and even then it may still run). This includes diesel (naturally),heating oil, parafin, cooking oil, hydraullic oil, terps - in fact anything that combusts when compressed. In France you can buy eco-diesel which is actually rape seed oil, and the South Africans used sunflower oil during the sanction years.

The big beef that HM Customs and Excise have is that it will not be taxed. DERV (Diesel Engined Road Vehicle) fuel is clear in Europe, any untaxed fuel is coloured. Agricultural diesel is dyed red (AKA red diesel), parafin pink and jet fuel straw coloured. HM C & E have been known to stop diesel cars, particularly in agricultural areas and 'dip' tanks to check the fuel. And if you have run untaxed fuel in the past but have DERV in the tank, they can still catch you out as your fuel filter will be stained by the dye.

The fine for being caught is big, but worse than that is that I have heard that you may also cop a bill for unpaid duty calculated on the assumption that you have done 15000 miles a year on untaxed fuel since you owned the car. Ouch!

[This message has been edited by Dan Winterland (edited 08 June 2001).]