A project to explore how plant material mowed from the county’s roadsides can be used for bio fuels and road materials has been given millions of pounds.

West Sussex County Council, working with South Gloucestershire Council and partners, has been given the green light to move forward with its new joint project Greenprint after receiving £4.7 million.

Funded by the Department for Transport (DfT), Live Labs 2 is a three-year national innovation programme developed by The Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning and Transport to achieve zero carbon local roads and highways across the UK.

Greenprint is one of seven projects spread across the UK, from Lanarkshire to Devon, to be awarded a share of the £30 million fund provided by DfT through its Live Labs 2: Decarbonising Local Roads competition.

The projects were selected after pitching their ideas to a Dragons’ Den style panel of independent experts drawn from the highways and transportation sector.

Greenprint aims to develop a first-of-its-kind approach to creating a net carbon negative model for delivering green infrastructure, such as producing alternative fuels for highways vehicles from road verge grass cuttings and tree prunings.

The Greenprint project will run for three years, with each council testing different approaches for processing green waste into useful products.

Councillor Joy Dennis, West Sussex County Council’s cabinet member for highways and transport, said: “This is great news for us in our drive to become carbon neutral by 2030, one of our key priorities. Being able to transform waste materials into something useful will help us on our decarbonisation journey and this partnership now has the funds to explore and trial this initiative in more detail.”

Roads Minister Richard Holden said: “The UK is a world leader in technology and innovation and we must use that strength to drive decarbonisation and the next generation of high tech jobs that go alongside it. We are supporting this vital agenda to help level-up through £30 million funding for ground-breaking projects and boosting regional connections to support growth.

“The government is determined to create good, well-paid jobs - via innovation and investment across the UK - as we accelerate the road to net zero.”