FUEL MANAGEMENT SYSTEM AND METHOD

• US 20120296549A1
• Filed: 01/24/2011
• Published: 11/22/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 01/22/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Shell USA Incorporated (Shell Plc)
• Original Assignee: Shell Oil Company (Shell Plc)
• Inventors: Adams, Peter W.
• Granted Patent: US 9,147,293 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/102
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0005 with arrangements to save energy
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 7/00 Methods or arrangements for processing data by operating upon the order or content of the data handled logic circuits H03K19/00
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/008 communicating information to a remotely located station transmission systems for measured values G08C
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/085 using electronic data carriers

Abstract

The present invention provides a system and a method for fuel management. The invention provides an integrated system to generate reports comprising analysis relating to fuel consumption, fuel fraud, CO2 emission, driver behaviour, and journey breakdown.

Claims

1. A fuel management system comprising:

a centralized processor;

a first module of the centralized processor configured to receive a plurality of fuel transaction data points from one or more fuelling stations;

a second module of the centralized processor configured to receive a plurality of vehicle parameters from one or more vehicles;

a third module of the centralized processor configured to process, according to a pre-defined set of rules, at least a part of the data received by the first module and the second module in combination with a set of information associated with each vehicle accessible to the third module, and to generate one or more reports providing a summary of the processing comprising analysis on one or more of fuel consumption, fuel fraud, CO2 emission, driver behaviour and journey breakdown; and

a fourth module of the centralized processor configured to store the one or more reports generated by the third module.

2. The fuel management system of claim 1, wherein the fuel transaction data points comprises one or more of the fuelling station location, the fuelling station number, date of transaction, time of transaction, fuel product type transacted, fuel quantity transacted and used fuel card'"'"'s information.

3. The fuel management system of claim 1, wherein the vehicle parameters comprises one or more of vehicle identification number, driver identification number, GPS information for the vehicle, fuel tank level change, engine torque, gear ratio, vehicle speed, vehicle acceleration, total distance covered, engine speed, brake pedal state, throttle pedal state, clutch pedal state, power take off (PTO) state, clutch pedal activation time, brake pedal activation time, clock time reading, odometer reading and engine coolant temperature.

4. The fuel management system of claim 1, wherein the set of information associated with each vehicle comprises vehicle identification number, driver identification number, fuel card information, route maps of the vehicles, wheel radius, vehicle unladen weight, available payload capacity and historical data associated with each vehicle and driver.

5. The fuel management system of claim 1, wherein the processing according to a predefined set of rules comprises determining if there is an anomaly between the fuel quantity transacted and the fuel tank level change in the vehicles and generate a fuel fraud alert if an anomaly is determined or else log the fuel transaction process as a refuelling event.

6. The fuel management system of claim 1, wherein the processing according to a predefined set of rules comprises determining the standard bio-content of the transacted fuel product type and then distance weighting the bio-content to report the average bio-content of the fuel used.

7. The fuel management system of claim 1, wherein the processing according to a predefined set of rules comprises determining the CO2 efficiency of the plurality of vehicles based on fuel volume used, average bio-content of the fuel used, distance weighted average payload of the vehicle and the total distance traversed.

8. A method for fuel management comprising:

connecting a fuel management system to an on-board unit of a vehicle, the fuel management system including a processing unit;

receiving a plurality of vehicle parameters at the processing unit the on-board unit; and

processing the vehicle parameters using the processing unit, according to a pre-defined set of rules, in combination with a set of information associated with each vehicle accessible to the processing unit.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the information associated with each vehicle includes engine torque represented as a third order polynominal.

10. The method of claim 9, including the step of calculating the engine torque using the third order polynominal, using one of the engine speed (rpm) or a percentage of the maximum engine torque.

11. The method of claim 8, including the step of using mass inputs to calculate the average vehicle mass.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the mass inputs include one or more of:

gear ratio, acceleration, engine torque, speed, and wheel radius.

13. The method of claim 8, including the step of calculating the gear ratio.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein calculating the gear ratio includes calculating the wheel speed, using the vehicle speed and the wheel radius.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein calculating the gear ratio includes calculating the gear ratio, using the wheel speed and the engine speed.

16. The method of claim 8, including the step of calculating the vehicle mass, using engine torque, vehicle speed, wheel radius.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the vehicle mass is calculated as:

Vehicle mass=0.8*{((Engine Torque/Gear Ratio)/Wheel Radius)−

(k0+(k2*Vehicle Speed̂

2))}/Acceleration.

18. A method for fuel management comprising:

receiving a plurality of fuel transaction data points at a centralized processor from a plurality of fuelling stations;

receiving a plurality of vehicle parameters at the centralized processor from a plurality of vehicles; and

processing, using the centralized processor, according to a pre-defined set of rules, at least a part of the fuel transaction data points and the vehicle parameters in combination with a set of information associated with each vehicle accessible to the centralized processor;

generating one or more reports providing a summary of the processing comprising analysis on one or more of fuel consumption, fuel fraud, fuel theft, fuel overfill, CO2 emission, driver behaviour and journey breakdown; and

storing the one or more reports generated in a memory unit of the centralized processor.

19. (canceled)