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HIGH-TECH FUEL MONITORING: ABOVEGROUND STORAGE TANKS ARE FRIENDLIER TO THE ENVIRONMENT
By Daniel C. Brown
Concrete Producer, The - August, 2005
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Rinker Materials Corp. has begun installing
wireless fuel management systems at several sites throughout the nation,
says a well-placed source within the company. The company that makes
the fuel management systems, SCI Distribution of Clearwater, Fla.,
says the systems will be installed at 50 Rinker locations in Florida
and 17 Florida Rock locations in the Southeast.
The SCI systems have
a leg up on the competition because they're
wireless; they use a radio frequency, says Tal Ezra, SCI's chief executive.
No trenches must be dug to install wires underground. When a Rinker
truck pulls in for fuel, the operator holds a special key in front
of the key reader on the fuel controller box, and the fuel pump can
be turned on.
With Rinker's system, the driver will use a keypad
at the controller to enter vehicle miles and/or hours. The SCI system
can be equipped with a Smart Mile system to collect
the miles and hours information wirelessly from the truck.
Next, the
vehicle number, the vehicle miles, hours, type of fuel, driver who
pumped the fuel, and location of the fuel site all is fed by wireless
communication to the ready-mix plant computer. "We're
talking with Rinker about more fuel management systems in Washington
state and Nevada," says SCI's Ezra.
Commonly, a new fuel management
system might be installed when a concrete producer removes its
fuel tanks from underground and puts in aboveground tank storage. "Rinker called us and
says they're taking their tanks out of the ground," says Mike
Evans, president and owner of Memco Inc.,
Killarney, Fla. Memco supplies Envirosafe
Tanks for aboveground applications, as well as the pumps, hose
reels, and associated equipment. Aboveground tanks are more
environmentally friendly, because one can see and repair any
fuel leaks that develop.
Ezra says Rinker plans to funnel all
fuel cost accounting information to its corporate
office in West Palm Beach, Fla. There, the producer will be
able to analyze fuel usage by vehicle, location, and division,
and will use the information for accounting purposes.
Fuel savings
Public works fleets also are working
hard to monitor and control fuel costs. Officials in Montgomery
County, Md., credit improved technology, restructured bus routes,
and fewer snowstorm-type events with helping to slash fuel usage
in recent years. The county's fuel use dropped from 7.5 million
gallons in 2002 to just 5.4 million gallons last year, counting
compressed natural gas, diesel fuel, unleaded gasoline and E-85,
or ethanol. "That's
a significant drop," says Mark Ricketts, program manager II
with the county's Division of Fleet Management
Services (FMS).
To monitor fuel use, FMS purchased
an automated system from Rapac Network International,
of Hackensack, N.J. By tapping into the Rapac database, Ricketts
can obtain miles-per-gallon information, transactional fuel
volume at a site or by pumping hose, and volume by fuel product
pumped.
FMS, which operates 14 automated, unattended fueling
sites, uses the fuel system to reconcile fuel pumped to fuel
purchased. "We
come up with less than 1% difference between the fuel we pump
and fuel we bought," says Ricketts. "The industry's acceptable
average is 2%."
With the Rapac system, each vehicle has a
programmable Vehicle Unit Interface (VUI), or a ring around
the fuel filler neck of the vehicle. When the dispenser nozzle
is inserted into the filler neck, the VUI transmits via a corresponding
ring on the nozzle the vehicle identification
number, its mileage or hours reading, and the type of fuel
the vehicle needs.
That information is instantly transmitted
to a site controller, which merges that string of vehicle information
with the site location, the hose being used, and the volume
of fuel being pumped. "That information is stored at the station controller
until we poll it," says Ricketts. "When it's polled, it goes
into a Rapac database. Then we can export
that information to our FASTER database, or our vehicular management
database."
(SCI Distribution also makes similar ring technology, called
RF Fuel. "We have installed the ring technology with Allied
Concrete in Houston," says Ezra.)
Billing advantages
And once Montgomery County's
information is in the database, the county uses it to determine
fuel billing to various agencies. That's not all. "Fuel is part of your cost per mile, and you
need cost per mile to develop a replacement cost system," says
Ricketts. Plus, the county uses the fuel
system's mileage information to schedule
preventive maintenance on vehicles.
And once Montgomery County's information is in the database,
the county uses it to determine fuel billing to various agencies.
That's not all. "Fuel is part of your cost per mile, and
you need cost per mile to develop a replacement cost system," says
Ricketts. Plus, the county uses the fuel
system's mileage information to schedule preventive maintenance
on vehicles.
Automated mileage entry is more accurate than
manual entry, which is needed with credit-card-type systems. "You can't
guarantee that operators will put the correct mileage into
the system," says Ricketts. And automated card systems often
control the amount of fuel pumped based
upon mileage. So if an operator puts in the wrong mileage,
he could be denied fuel with a card system.
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