With the price of gas rising, BC Ferries is implementing a fuel surcharge of 1.5 per cent effective June 1.
This means that taking a trip on the Metro Vancouver-Vancouver Island routes will cost 25 cents more for an adult passenger and 85 cents more for a vehicle.
Other routes will see increases of between five and 25 cents per passenger and 20 to 85 cents per vehicle. (See the attached photo on the side of this article for the full list.)
For the past 15 years BC Ferries has been using a system of rebates and surcharges to mediate the volatile prices of fuel.
BC Ferries says it doesn't benefit financially from the surcharges.
“We now have five vessels operating on liquefied natural gas (LNG), a cleaner and less expensive fuel source than the ultra-low sulphur diesel we use for our other vessels," said BC Ferries president and CEO Mark Collins on Thursday.
"LNG is approximately 50 per cent less expensive than diesel, and its use results in fuel savings that are passed on to our customers. Despite fuel switching and other initiatives to burn fuel more efficiently, a fuel surcharge is now necessary.”
Fuel is the ferry service's second-largest expense, after labour.
The surcharge will be added to all routes except the Port Hardy-Prince Rupert, Prince Rupert-Haida Gwaii and Port Hardy-Central Coast routes. They have a separate system determining the cost of fuel and are exempt from the charge, according to BC Ferries.
BC Ferries plans on further reducing their fuel consumption by adding diesel-electric battery hybrid vessels sometime in the future.
