New AFLEET Tool

The Energy Department recently asked Argonne National Laboratory to use their expertise and brilliant skills to develop a tool to help Clean Cities stakeholders to estimate petroleum use, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, air pollutant emissions, and the cost of ownership of light-duty and heavy-duty vehicles. Using simple spreadsheet inputs, the Alternative Fuel Life-Cycle Environmental and Economic Transportation Tool is simple to comprehend and apply.

The AFLEET Tool provides three calculation methods depending on the user's goals:

• Simple Payback Calculator - estimates a simple payback of purchase of a new AFV compared to a conventional counterpart using acquisition and annual operating costs, as well as average annual petroleum use, GHGs, and air pollutant emissions.

• Total Cost of Ownership Calculator - estimates the net present value of operating and fixed costs over the years of planned ownership of a new vehicle, as well as lifetime petroleum use, GHGs and air pollutant emissions

• Fleet Energy and Emissions Footprint Calculator - estimates the annual petroleum use, GHGs and air pollutant emissions of existing and new vehicles, taking into consideration that older vehicles typically have higher air pollutant emission rates than newer ones.

Data from Argonne's Greenhouse gases, Regulated Emissions, and Energy use in Transportation (GREET) tool is used, as well as Environmental Protection Agency's MOtor Vehicle Emission Simulator (MOVES), making AFLEET a comprehensive tool. Other sources are included as well to provide default cost data and other numbers for your fleet. Keep in mind that using your own data, true to your fleet, will calculate data closer to your needs. 

Access the ready-to-go spreadsheets to generate data unique to your fleet and company on Argonne's AFLEET website to begin.