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Calculating truck carbon emissions made easy

Truck operators struggling to decide on the cost-effectiveness of various fuel saving and CO2 emissions-cutting options have a new online source of information to which they can turn for expert guidance.

TRuck-emmissions

The SRF Optimiser is described as a “web-based decision support tool”. It has been developed jointly by the Centre for Sustainable Road Freight (CfSRF), a consortium with members including Cambridge and Heriot-Watt universities as well as several high-profile organisations in engineering, logistics and research, and Value Chain Lab, a fledgling (three-year-old) London-based management consultancy and information services company specialising in supply chains.

The SRF Optimiser is free to use. An operator simply keys in their own fleet data to calculate carbon emissions based on the latest factors from DEFRA, the government’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Various influences on fuel economy can be analysed, including air-management kits, driver behaviour and fuel types such as diesel, bio-diesel and CNG/LNG (compressed natural gas and liquefied natural gas). One SFR Optimiser feature sure to be appreciated by large fleet operators is its ability to generate inputs for ESOS (Energy Savings Opportunity Scheme) fleet emission reporting. ESOS is a mandatory energy assessment scheme introduced by the government two years ago to comply with an EU directive on energy efficiency. It applies to all “large” UK companies (250 or more employees).

“This is an important carbon-saving tool available to any organisation, business or company involved in road freight,” says Phil Greening, Associate Professor at Heriot-Watt University. “It can calculate real cost, carbon and energy savings for many types of road freight operation, enabling a fleet manager to carry out what-if studies free-of-charge. And it could avoid uneconomic investment in new equipment.”
CfSRF is funded by an EPSRC (Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council) grant and by subscriptions from consortium members. Its primary aim is development of ways and means to help road-freight play its part in meeting the government target of an 80% cut in CO2 emissions by 2050.

For more information go to: http://www.csrf.ac.uk/srf-optimiser-2/
To download the SRF Optimiser user-guide, go to:
www.csrf.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/SRF-Optimiser-User-Guide-2015.pdf.