Need to Reduce Your Fleet Emissions?

If you have a fleet and you operate in London, it’s likely that lowering your fleet emissions is top of your agenda since the Mayor announced plans for an Ultra-Low Emission Zone by 2020.  But, even if this is not you, shouldn’t it be something that you’re thinking about anyway?
Global warming is said to be the greatest challenge of the 21st century.  With a quarter of UK and US carbon emissions emanating from road transport, fleets are at the forefront of efforts to drive down CO2.

So – how do you monitor your emissions and what can you do to reduce them?
Well, keeping track of your fleet fuel usage is key here and utilizing fuel cards and Engine Control Management (ECM) systems can help hugely.
A simple calculation can then give you the number you’re dealing with:

To obtain the number of grams of CO2 emitted per gallon of gasoline combusted, the heat content of the fuel per gallon is multiplied by the kg CO2 per heat content of the fuel.

The average heat content per gallon of gasoline is 0.125 mmbtu/gallon and the average emissions per heat content of gasoline is 71.35 kg CO2/mmbtu (EPA 2012). The fraction oxidized to CO2 is 100 percent (IPCC 2006).

Calculation

0.125 mmbtu/gallon × 71.35 kg CO2/mmbtu × 1 metric ton/1,000 kg = 8.92 × 10-3 metric tons CO2/gallon of gasoline

The US Environmental Protection Agency offers a variety of other such information online.

Now – what to do about it?

There are a variety of factors to bear in mind here from vehicle choice, fleet maintenance, driver behavior and the journey taken.  It is the most often over-looked of these that tends to have the biggest effect and that is driver performance…

Research shows that fleet driving behavior contributes to over 80% of crashes and up to 33% of fleet fuel consumption.  Driver performance and fleet safety management solutions, such as GreenRoad, reduce these fleet costs and risks by improving driving performance.  By using a combination of in-vehicle technology and change management focus, you can coach your fleet drivers without expensive training.

With safer drivers you are not only reducing your fuel consumption and emissions, but you are also meeting your ‘duty of care’ requirements and can reduce your insurance premiums.  That’s not to mention all of the great additional features, such as advanced fleet vehicle tracking, that can help you to really keep on top of your fleet operations.

On announcing London’s Ultra-Low Emission Zone, the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson said:

“My vision is a central zone where almost all the vehicles running during working hours are either zero or low emission.”

This might sound ambitious, but bring it on Boris..!

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