Fleet Management News & Business Info | Commercial Carrier Journal
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/993011
38 commercial carrier journal | june 2018 technology Fair assessments Vnomics helps drivers maximize fuel savings BY AARON HUFF W hile connecting a telematics system to an electronically controlled engine provides access to fuel performance data about drivers and trucks, an important piece is missing. Actual fuel results and driving behav- iors are helpful to know, but what should vehicles and drivers be able to achieve given the varying conditions of weather, payload, topography, traffic patterns and other factors? Technology suppliers can tap into the heart of fuel performance data to calcu- late realistic fuel targets and share them with drivers and fleet managers in ways that change behaviors and empower fuel-saving decisions. Reaching the potential One such product is True Fuel from Vnomics. Its machine-learning algo- rithms determine the fuel potential of vehicles — the optimal amount of fuel required to do the work at any given time. By knowing the potential, True Fuel can score drivers using a fair and transparent measure of individual fuel efficiency that's independent of vehicle, load and route, said Alan Farnsworth, chief executive of Vnomics. Hardware in the vehicle provides audible tones when drivers exceed thresholds for fuel-efficient behaviors in categories such as speeding, idling and engine control (rpms). True Fuel also has cellular connectivity with a data center that powers a web-based management portal. Vnomics recently added a product extension designed to make it easier for fleets to offer an automated driver recog- nition, incentive and rewards program based on fuel efficiency. "Fuel prices are going up, driver scar- city is an issue everywhere, and getting drivers and fleets aligned when it comes to fuel-efficient driving is a challenge that True Fuel is uniquely positioned to address," Farnsworth said. True Fuel has an automated ROI calculator that fleets can use to determine "gain share" formulas for driver fuel in- centives and predict the payback period, he said. The system's mobile app is designed to convey immediate feedback to drivers af- ter every shift. The app displays a detailed trip-by-trip log of location, mileage, time, fuel burned and driver efficiency, allowing drivers to see if they are on pace to meet the fleet driver efficiency target. The app also shows drivers their month-to-date efficiency compared to the target and provides visual granular feedback on what they can do to im- prove, Farnsworth said. Gaining insights With True Fuel's management portal, fleet managers have a dashboard of fuel performance metrics they can group in a variety of ways. Dashboard met- rics include scores for driver efficiency (normalized on a 0-100 scale); categories for fuel efficiency such as engine speed control, highway speeding, idling and truck gearing vs. task at hand; and the quantified gallons of fuel wasted in each category of efficiency. Fleet managers also can view miles, gallons consumed, the calculated mpg (based on fuel flow rate) and the poten- tial mpg for each vehicle. One metric is "time saved" versus the extra gallons burned during excessive highway speed events. "Drivers and fleet managers can see how much time they actually saved compared to the amount of fuel wasted in gallons and dollars by overspeeding on the highway," Farnsworth said. With this metric, a manager can dif- fuse a driver's "I had to go fast" argument to reach a destination on time, he said. Fuel-saving decisions Besides tracking fuel lost due to in- efficient driver behaviors, True Fuel's ability to quantify the potential mpg of a particular vehicle when driven properly – independent of driver behavior and other variables – can be used to test the fuel impact of a wide range of technolo- gies and add-on devices. Farnsworth said fleets are using the data to make new truck purchase deci- sions and to test the impacts of adding trailer skirts and undercarriage devices. This is possible by assessing the change in actual mpg to determine the contribu- tion of the device being tested. One customer used True Fuel data to quantify the impact of raising governed speed. "We were able to calculate exactly how much this would cost in additional fuel spend so that they could compare that cost to their perceived driver relationship benefit," Farnsworth said. "In the end, they decided not to do it." in focus: FUEL-SAVING TECHNOLOGIES With Vnomics' True Fuel management portal, fleet managers have a dashboard of fuel performance metrics they can group in a variety of ways.