Speaker
Description
Globally, road transportation is a major source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. One possible option to lower GHG emissions of road transportation is to use alternative fuels, for instance liquefied biogas (LBG) and electricity, on vehicles. During recent years, LBG-powered trucks have grown in number even on the road transportation of the forest sector, such as timber trucks and woodchip trucks. In this study, we utilized a holistic approach to consider all possible impacting variables to explain energy consumption and further GHG emissions.
Dataset consisted of vehicle information from seven heavy-duty (gross vehicle weight of 75 tonnes) woodchip truck combinations. Three of the trucks were LBG-powered and rest were diesel-powered vehicles (references). Additionally, multiple different data sources (i.e., weather information, route properties and driver-related variables) were included in the study. The dataset had 7310 payloads and the total mileage of the vehicles during the study was over 1.3 million kilometers.
According to our preliminary results, on transportation cycle, including 100 km empty driving, loading payload, 100 km laden driving and unloading payload, the LBG combinations used 6% more energy compared to the diesel vehicles when a measurement of MJ tkm-1 was applied. However, the LBG combinations had 60% lower emissions (g CO2eq. tkm-1) compared to the diesel vehicles when the default emission factors of the ISO 14083:2023 standard were utilized.
Moreover, the variables affecting energy consumption were detected. From weather variables rain occurrence, ambient temperature and snow cover accumulation on the road had statistically significant influence on energy consumption. Furthermore, from road properties, mean grade between starting and ending points of the trip and elevation variation during the route affected energy consumption. Respectively from driver-related variables, time since the driver has completed eco-driving course for Driver Certificate of Professional Competence renewal influenced energy consumption.
| Keywords | Alternative fuels; Holistic approach |
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