Increase in fleet fuel in 2023

The City of Virginia Beach (Virginia) council has agreed to increase its fuel budget by $1.35 million to allow city departments to pay for the higher cost of fuel and ensure fleet vehicles continue to operate. The retail cost for regular gasoline has risen to $4.49 per gallon, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

NYC also should spend more in fuel. Keeping the nation’s largest municipal fleet fueled cost the city a projected $81.8 million for the 2022 fiscal year. Nick Benson, director of communications for the New York City Department of Citywide Administrative Services (DCAS), said that’s compared to $50 million the previous fiscal year. That’s a 61% increase in fuel costs.

The higher costs are not only due to a major uptick in fuel use. The city used about 26 million gallons of fuel during FY2022, compared to 25.8 million gallons the previous year. Benson said the slight increase is due to government services resuming to a pre-pandemic level after seeing a slight drop in FY2021.

Fleet departments across the country have been dealing with higher fuel costs since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in late February.

The city is also working to reduce its fleet size. Earlier this year, New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced a reduction of the city’s fleet size by at least 855 vehicles, in an effort to save taxpayer dollars and reduce carbon emissions.

A good first step to control municipal fleet fuel consumption is to understand where and when fuel consumption is occurring.  This information can help municipal officials, staff, and volunteers to identify major sources of fuel consumption, and decide where to focus fuel usage reduction efforts.

Link2Pump service can be very useful in this area, as we offer solutions such as:

— instant tracking of fuel expenditures by department

— real-time tracking and reporting by vehicle, driver, division and more

— no fuel misuse, our system can prevent drivers from accidentally filling gas into diesel powered vehicles

With these tools, you can have a complete fuel log from each vehicle and monitor fuel use for all vehicles using the municipal pumps.