Fuels: tankers can drive every day, even on Sundays and public holidays, to serve service stations

The government has authorized until Monday May 11 the circulation of tank trucks transporting hydrocarbons and serving service stations everywhere and throughout the weekend as well as on Mondays and public holidays, in order to avoid the risk of shortages, according to a decree published this Friday April 10 in the Official Journal.

“The traffic bans on goods transport vehicles weighing more than 7.5 tonnes (…) are lifted until May 11, 2026 at 10 a.m. for vehicles transporting hydrocarbon products serving service stations”, according to the decree.

The lifting of the bans concerns “Sundays and public holidays as well as the day before and after Sundays and public holidays”, specify the Ministries of the Interior and Transport. The empty return of the vehicles concerned is also authorized for these days.

“Prevent any risk of supply disruption”

“In normal times, only fuel deliveries to service stations located on motorways, roads with restricted access, as well as airports and sea and river ports, benefit from an exemption from the ban on the circulation of heavy goods vehicles on Sundays and public holidays,” explains the Ministry of Transport in a press release.

An almost similar decree was issued by the Paris police headquarters for Easter Monday.

The government justifies this measure by “the essential nature for the national economy of ensuring the continuity of the distribution of hydrocarbons in service stations” and “the need to prevent any risk of disruption of fuel supplies to service stations in the context of the armed conflict in the Middle East”.

Thursday morning on Franceinfo, the Minister of the Economy Roland Lescure said that 13% of stations had a “tendency to run out of fuel by the time they were restocked”. “At the end of the Easter weekend, we were at 20%,” he added.