COMMUNITY development charity, the Community Council of Devon, is celebrating the second birthday of the Devon Oil Collective with the news that it has saved residents more than £37,000 on their heating oil.

The charity launched the Devon Oil Collective in February 2012 to help tackle the rising price of oil.

It forms part of the charity's aims to tackle fuel poverty, which increasingly leaves residents having to choose between eating and heating.

This is particularly important in a large rural county like Devon, where currently 49,000 households are classified as in fuel poverty.

The scheme works on the principle of buying heating oil in bulk through consolidating its members' orders.

The collective places an order via their broker who will negotiate the best possible price on their behalf.

The £37,000 saving for oil collective members has been achieved over 1,124 individual orders totalling over 850,000 litres of oil in the last two years.

The scheme has saved members on average 4.53 pence per litre of heating oil. For a typical order of 1,000 litres, this means a saving of around £45.

For more information visit http://www.devonrcc.org.uk">www.devonrcc.org.uk or call 01392 248919 extension 290.