The centre of excellence for low carbon technologies has added the new software to its existing Fleet Carbon Reduction Tool, designed “to inform and educate” fleets of the environmental and cost implications of switching to gas fuel.
The simulation takes its data from the on-going three-year R&D project, funded by Innovate UK, as part of the UK’s Low Carbon Truck demonstration programme.
Throughout the project, Cenex has been developing the simulation, which calculates the cost and carbon emission savings from gas trucks, compared to conventional diesel engine trucks.
“The real benefit is that we can assess gas vehicle performance before the onset of costly vehicle trials or purchases,” explains Steve Carroll, senior technical specialist at Cenex (pictured).
“The truck model allows us to show the cost and carbon benefits of operating gas trucks in a bespoke fleet environment,” he continues.
“We record GPS data from fleet vehicles and run this through our model, which allows us to estimate the total cost and emission savings, not only for the fleet but also on a per route basis.”
Throughout the three-year project, Cenex managed the performance evaluation of 40 natural gas trucks, and led the testing and validation work that examined economics, fuel consumption, carbon emissions, noise performance, air quality performance and driver perceptions.