The present disclosure relates generally to systems and methods for managing a work site and, more particularly, to a method for managing a work site based on vehicle operation.

BACKGROUND

Operators that employ one or more vehicles in a work site may be interested in monitoring the operation of the one or more vehicles and in managing the utilization of the vehicles and haul routes. For example, in a work site such as a mine there may be a fleet of vehicles to transport materials, equipment or people within the mine site and between the mine site and other facilities, the productivity of the mine is directly dependent upon the health and productivity of the vehicles in the fleet and on the site conditions over which the vehicles must traverse. For some vehicles, such as transport vehicles and haulers, productivity depends significantly upon work site conditions, such as terrain conditions, weather conditions, etc., as these conditions often affect speed, handling, traction and fuel efficiency of the vehicles.

It may be necessary for an operator to monitor the fleet operation and site conditions for mine planning, to assess the need for route modification and future design.

Operators in charge of work site management may wish to determine an effective flat haul (EFH) value for routes being travelled by their vehicles. EFH is a 'relative' distance measure used to compare haulage routes. The relation is based solely on travel time.

The basic principle is to assign an EFH value to a road segment that is the length of an equivalent flat segment. EFH is used as a comparative measure of haulage between routes, schedules and schedule periods and can be used to determine vehicle condition and maintenance requirements.

Traditionally, EFH is calculated based on travel time.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

In accordance with one aspect of the present disclosure, there is provided a method for managing a work site comprising: obtaining a flat haul efficiency baseline for a vehicle; logging fuel consumption data for the vehicle based on a route travelled by the vehicle through the work site; processing the fuel consumption data against the flat haul efficiency baseline to determine an effective flat haul value for the route; and comparing the effective flat haul value against a threshold effective flat haul value to identify whether the route is acceptable based on the effective flat haul value.

In accordance with one aspect of the present disclosure, there is provided a work site management system comprising: a fuel meter on a vehicle for the work site, the fuel meter configured to measure fuel consumption for the vehicle; a controller with a stored flat haul efficiency baseline for the vehicle, the controller configured to (a) communicate with the fuel meter to log a fuel consumption value for the vehicle and (b) process the fuel consumption value with reference to the stored flat haul efficiency baseline to determine and report an effective flat haul distance for the vehicle on a route within the work site.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary work site in which the systems and methods of the disclosed embodiments are employed;

FIG. 2 provides a schematic diagram illustrating certain components associated with a work site management system;

FIG, 3 provides a schematic diagram illustrating certain on-board components associated with the work site management system of FIG. 2; and

FIG. 4 provides a flowchart depicting one exemplary method for managing haul routes in work sites, consistent with certain disclosed embodiments.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

In FIG. 1 , a work site 100 is illustrated in which the systems and methods of the disclosed embodiments are employed. Work site 100 may be a site for mining, construction, energy exploration and/or generation, manufacturing, transportation, agriculture, etc. According to the exemplary embodiment illustrated in FIG. 1 , work site 100 may include a mining environment that comprises one or more vehicles 120, some or all of which are used in a work site management system 104. The system employs on-board vehicle components connected via a communication network 130. Work site 100 may be configured to monitor, sample, collect, log, filter and/or analyze information associated with the status or performance, such as fuel consumption, of one or more vehicles 120, and distribute the information to one or more back-end systems or entities, such as a vehicle-remote side of the system 135 and/or subscriber 170. It is contemplated that additional and/or different components than those listed above may be included in work site 100.

Fuel consumption alone or with other vehicle status and performance criteria may enhance opportunities for work site management.

As illustrated in FIG. 1 , vehicles 120 may include one or more transport vehicles configured to transport materials, equipment or people within work site 100 over one or more haul routes 102. Vehicles 120 may be, for example, articulated trucks, dump trucks, buses or any other truck adapted to transport materials, equipment or people. The number, sizes, and types of vehicles illustrated in FIG. 1 are exemplary only and not intended to be limiting. Accordingly, it is contemplated that work site 100 may include additional, fewer, and/or different components than those listed above.

In one embodiment, at least one of the vehicles 120 may include on-board data collection and communication equipment to monitor, collect, and/or distribute information associated with the at least one vehicle 120. While not all vehicles require on-board data collection and communication equipment, each vehicle may include the equipment if desired. Alternately, selected vehicles may carry the equipment. In one embodiment, at least one vehicle in each haul route may include the on-board data collection and communication equipment.

As shown in FIG. 2, each of the vehicles 120 with the on-board data collection and communication equipment may include, among other things, one or more monitoring devices 121 including at least a fuel consumption monitoring device 151 and possibly other devices, such as sensors, electronic control modules, etc. coupled to one or more data collectors 125 via communication connections 122; one or more transceiver devices 126; and/or any other components for sampling, logging and communicating information associated with the operation of vehicles 120 based on fuel consumption. The

components described above are exemplary and not intended to be limiting. Accordingly, the disclosed embodiments contemplate each of vehicles 120 including additional and/or different components than those listed above.

Monitoring devices 121 include at least fuel consumption monitoring device 151 such as a fuel meter to directly measure fuel consumption. In one embodiment shown in FIG. 3, fuel consumption monitoring device 151 includes two fuel meters 151a, 151b for each vehicle 120 to be monitored.

One meter 151a is installed in the feed fuel line of the vehicle 120. It measures the quantity of fuel that flows from the fuel tank to the engine. The second meter 151b is installed in the return line and measures the fuel that flows from the engine back to the tank. Fuel consumption, therefore, is the difference in the amount of fuel that flows to, and returns from the engine back to the tank.

In one embodiment, meters 151a, 151b may be volumeters, which measure the volume of fuel passing. Because fuel density varies with temperature, and fuel temperature will vary with ambient conditions and more importantly fuel temperature will increase as the fuel flows through the engine. Thus, the fuel returning from the engine is hotter and therefore less dense, the result is that the fuel expands between the feed meter 151a and the return meter 151b which may cause a pure volumetric measurement to under-report fuel consumed. To address this, each volumeter may include a temperature sensor to detect the temperature of the fuel. The temperature is used in combination with density tables or functions to compute a temperature corrected volume, or alternatively a mass.

Another option is to use a mass measurement fuel meter to measure fuel consumption rather than a volumeter. A mass measurement fuel meter directly measures mass rather than volume and temperature.

In one embodiment, a fuel meter can be employed that also can detect forward and reverse flow through the meter. In this way, if flow briefly reverses direction, the meter accurately reflects the reversal and avoids counting the flow multiple times (i.e. Pass 1 forward, Pass 2 reverse, Pass 3 final forward). However, it is noted that flow does not typically reverse during standard operation.

Further monitoring devices 121 may be employed for collecting further data associated with one or more vehicles 120. For example, monitoring devices 121 may include one or more sensors for measuring an operational parameter such as engine and/or machine speed and/or location; electric current and/or voltage levels; loading levels (i.e., payload value, percent of maximum payload limit, payload history, payload distribution, etc.); grade; and any other operational parameter of vehicles 120. In one embodiment, transport vehicles 120 that are being monitored may each include any or all of:

• A device 152 for vehicle network integration: A worksite vehicle, such as a

mining vehicle, is equipped with a network of connected devices including, for example, computers/microcontrollers. Each of these is generally responsible for accepting, measuring and interpreting sensor inputs and possibly controlling vehicle subsystems. In general, data that is measured and interpreted by one of these devices is shared with all other devices by being placed on the vehicle network. Thus, device 152 may provide access to these measured values from the vehicle network. Device 152 may be configured provide measured values to exclude fuel use that may occur while the vehicle is not moving, to isolate the fuel burn during load and dump from the fuel consumption during the travel within the work site and/or to detect load weight to automatically detect a loaded section of a haul route by examining the changing value of load weight in the truck box/tray. For example, typically, a truck may have a suspension pressure sensor for each corner of the vehicle. Each time the bucket is fully raised and subsequently lowered, the payload controller will tare the weight and make a note of the suspension pressures. As the vehicle is loaded the suspension pressures will increase and a mathematical formula is used to convert this increase in suspension pressure to a value of payload weight. Device 152 may have access to this information, as it is added to the vehicle network by the payload controller.

• Inclinometer/slope sensor 153: To detect when a vehicle is moving along a sloped surface and possibly the grade of the surface. The data from this sensor would be used to differentiate between flat and sloped sections of routes.

• An input device 154 that can be used to indicate the start and the end of a route.

Device 154 may include a button that the vehicle operator could press to indicate the start and the end of a route. Alternately, device 152 may provide this information by monitoring payload weight changes, as described above. • A location sensor 155 such as a global positioning system (GPS), which is used to locate a vehicle and to identify a route travelled.

• A tripometer 156 to determine distance travelled and may be integrated with a GPS, vehicle network, accelerometer, etc.

• Sensors 157 such as speedometers, altimeters, motion sensors for determining speed, heading and altitude; and/or

• A clock for providing time, date, etc. information.

As will be appreciated, in some embodiments, one type of sensor, such as a GPS, may be useful to act as more than one of the above-noted sensors. Also, for example, a motion sensor may provide vehicle orientation and acceleration, including pitch, roll, yaw (heading) and lateral, longitudinal and vertical acceleration and as such may provide all of the functionality of an incline/slope sensor, accelerometer, etc. In one embodiment, a motion sensor may be employed that includes a 3 -axis accelerometer, a 3 -axis gyro and a 3 -axis magnetometer. Such a motion sensor may permit acceleration to be differentiated from tilt, which can be a problem with some standard slope sensors.

As will also be appreciated, some sensors may not be suitable for certain worksite conditions. For example, some mine topography, such as high walls, or vehicle size, may render antenna reception, such as for GPS, less reliable and so, for example, distance may be more readily determined by monitoring speed from vehicle network integration, such as from a vehicle's transmission controller, and then integrating to get distance.

Data collector 125 may be configured to receive, sample, collect, package, log, analyze and/or distribute performance data collected by monitoring devices 121. Performance data, as the term is used herein, refers to any type of data indicative of at least one operational aspect associated with one or more vehicles 120 or any of its constituent components or subsystems including at least fuel consumption. Non-limiting further examples of performance data may include, for example, vehicle status information such as engine power status (e.g., engine running, idle, off), engine hours, engine speed, vehicle movement and possibly travelling speed, vehicle location, vehicle load condition, vehicle orientation with respect to route grade, altitude, manifold air pressure, accelerator pedal position, or any other data indicative of a status of machine 120.

Data collector 125 may receive performance data from one or more monitoring devices 121 via communication connections 122 such as wirelessly or via lines during operations of the vehicle. According to one embodiment, data collector 125 may automatically transmit the received data to vehicle-remote side of the system 135 via communication network 130. Alternatively or additionally, data collector 125 may store the received data in memory for a predetermined time period, for later transmission to vehicle-remote side of the system 135. For example, if a communication channel between the vehicle and vehicle-remote side of the system 135 becomes temporarily unavailable, the performance data may be retrieved for subsequent transmission when the communication channel has been restored.

Communication network 130 may include any network that provides two-way communication between vehicles 120 and an off-board system, such as vehicle-remote side of the system 135. For example, communication network 130 may communicatively couple data collectors 125 of vehicles 120 to vehicle-remote side of the system 135 across a wireless networking platform such as, for example, a satellite communication system. Alternatively and/or additionally, communication network 130 may include one or more broadband communication platforms appropriate for communicatively coupling one or more vehicles 120 to vehicle-remote side of the system 135 such as, for example, cellular, Bluetooth, microwave, point-to-point wireless, point-to-multipoint wireless, multipoint-to-multipoint wireless, or any other appropriate communication platform for networking a number of components. Although communication network 130 is illustrated as a satellite wireless communication network, it is contemplated that communication network 130 may include wireline networks such as, for example, Ethernet, fiber optic, waveguide, or any other type of wired communication network. In one embodiment, at least some of the foregoing further monitoring devices 152 to 157 and data collecting system 125 can be combined in a controller 158 such as an internet connected microcontroller capable of sampling, logging, analyzing and transmitting performance data feeds with some internal and some external, connected monitoring devices, instrumentation, and electronic systems. In one embodiment, controller 158 is an internet connected, such as a cloud connected fuel meter controller. A cloud connected fuel meter controller's primary function is to accept the signals generated by the fuel meter 151. In an embodiment with the feed and return fuel meters 151a, 151b, the controller accepts volume and temperature signals from the meters to compute the feed, return and consumption fuel flow rates and totals.

Controller 158 may also have a locator 156 or a tripometer 157 or devices with such functionality such as a GPS device, which provides access to location, speed, heading, altitude and date/time information.

The controller may also have access to information from vehicle network integration device 152. Such information may include, for example, speed, vehicle stop and start data or the loading or unloading of a haul truck tray.

The controller includes a motion sensor device that can determine the attitude of the vehicle and, therefore, the ramp angle. A ramp in this case refers to a portion of a haul route that is sloped, but is the term used to refer to sloped routes within a mine. The motion sensor can detect changes in the ramp angle. When detecting changes in road grade angle as the truck transitions from a flat to a sloped portion of the road (i.e. the transition onto a ramp), the controller could be configured to automatically start the EFH data collection. Changes in ramp angle can also be used to automatically trigger or stop and start EFH data acquisition.

The controller includes an altimeter 157 that can be used to compute gross and net vertical travel across haul route segment.

Controller 158 is configured to communicate with the various devices and may perform onboard processing.

Controller 158 also includes a component 126 for external communication, for example, operation with communication network 130 such as a wide area network, WI-FI, cloud, internet, etc. Device may be a cellular internet modem, but alternatively may be a WI-FI adapter, or wired Ethernet adapter. Controller 158, therefore, is configured to connect to vehicle-remote side 135 of the system.

The controller may be accommodated in a single or multiple enclosures.

The on-vehicle components of the system, including the fuel meter 151 and the controller 158, are installed in one or more selected vehicles in the work site. Controller 158 is in communication with the separate vehicle sensors and the fuel meters. If controller 158 has certain sensprs that are orientation specific, the installation site should be appropriate with respect to gravity and/or direction of travel, etc.

The system's vehicle-remote side 135 of the system may include one or more hardware components and/or software applications that cooperate to manage haul route 102 design by monitoring and analyzing performance or operation of one or more individual vehicles 120.

In addition, it is noted that worksite vehicles may be equipped with a number of other technologies for other aspects of worksite management, such as vehicle diagnostic loggers, dispatch systems, etc. These technologies may work cooperatively or independently from the above-described sensors and controller. In one embodiment, controller 158 also is configured for supporting (monitoring, logging, communicating with and for, etc.) these technologies. The system's vehicle-remote side 135 includes a communication system 142, storage 143, a fuel consumption analyzer 150 and a reporting system 146.

Communication system 142 enables the movement of data from field equipment, such as vehicles 120, through network 130 to storage 143, analyzer 150 and reporting system 146 so that it can be provided to subscriber 170, such as servers in the work site management office. There are numerous possible wired and wireless communication solutions that can be used to move data off of a vehicle and to a subscriber. It may be useful to make use of whatever communication system is already operating in a work site, such as a mine. As an example, communication system 142 could employ a work site network infrastructure. For example, if a work site has installed a site wide WIFI system, a wireless Ethernet adapter could be installed to communicate the data from vehicle 120 to an internet connected server of subscriber 170. In some cases, each vehicle has a wireless Ethernet adapter that acts as a gateway and several on-board systems that generate data, such as devices 151-157 and possibly others related to other aspects of worksite management, are connected, for example, by wire to this gateway for moving data to the mine office. The wireless Ethernet adapter may be a component of controller 158. Alternately or in addition, the vehicle onboard system may include a cellular modem that is capable of communicating directly with internet servers. In such an embodiment, communication system 142 can bypass the work site I.T. systems and use public cellular networks 130. Typically, network connected equipment in a mine does not have access to the internet, rather having only a local network. If the data is to be sent to the cloud there needs to be a server and software responsible for collecting the data generated by fielded equipment and delivering it to the cloud.

The system's vehicle-remote side 135 also includes storage 143, fuel consumption analyzer 150 and reporting system 146. Storage 143, fuel consumption analyzer 150 and reporting system 146 may be provided via software and/or hardware such as servers and other processors. In particular, while storage 143, fuel consumption analyzer 150 and reporting system 146 are illustrated as separate systems, they may be included as a single, integrated software package or hardware system. Alternatively or additionally, these systems may embody separate standalone modules configured to interact or cooperate to facilitate operation of one or more of the other systems. For example, these systems may include database servers and software to store the data and to service requests for data recall, servers and software for processing web request from customers, displaying and exporting data per the design of the application, and fuel consumption analysis software and servers responsible for processing the fuel consumption data to compute effective flat haul, and other useful quantities. It is possible and quite likely that one or more of the noted servers are embodied in the same machine.

Storage 143, fuel consumption analyzer 150 and reporting system 146 may be part of the work site IT environment wherein the equipment fuel consumption and other data is never sent to the cloud. In such an embodiment, stored data 143 and fuel consumption analyzer 150 and reporting system 146 software resides and operates on subscriber's server and that server computes EFH by fuel and enables the subscriber to view directly and report the data and the analysis. In one embodiment, however, haul route

management system 135 is supported as a web portal by a service provider, such as the present applicant, and subscriber 170 may log into the web portal to review the data and analysis or the web-based system may generate a report for the subscriber.

The controller 158 and/or fuel consumption analyzer 150 can process the performance data and output worksite management information. In one embodiment, the worksite management information relates to effective flat haul (EFH) values so that a work site operator can determine once or on an ongoing basis if the haul route is acceptable or if it will adversely impact profitability or efficiency.

To determine an effective flat haul value, a worksite management system 104 (FIG. 2) is employed using a vehicle fitted with a fuel meter, for example one shown in FIG. 3 with fuel meters 151a, 151b, and controller 158 with an analyzer function or a fuel consumption analyzer 150, in a vehicle-remote system 135.

To manage a work site, such as to monitor EFH for a haul route, a method is followed according to FIG. 4. A flat haul fuel efficiency baseline is obtained 210 for a vehicle to be used in the method. The flat haul fuel efficiency baseline may be from obtained based on information from analysis of similar vehicles. Alternately, and preferably, any flat haul fuel efficiency baseline is calculated from the actual vehicle being employed for further EFH measurements. In one embodiment, the stored baseline may be obtained during initial set up of the system for a particular work site. In any event, a flat haul fuel efficiency baseline is obtained by operating a vehicle, for example, the vehicle to be used for ongoing EFH measurements, over a segment of flat road and recording speed, distance and fuel use to arrive at a flat haul fuel consumption and, therefore, with reference to the distance travelled, a flat haul fuel efficiency baseline. If desired, a plurality of flat haul fuel consumption measurements can be obtained that are relevant to specific conditions, for example, based on travel speed, vehicle loading, road condition, etc. to arrive at an averaged baseline or a plurality of condition-dependent baselines.

The calculated flat haul baselines may be made during initial set up of a management system or may be may be determined and augmented 212 occasionally or at all times during vehicle operation on flat road segments.

The flat haul road segment may be identified within the work site being managed or may be other flat road segments. In one embodiment, flat haul baselines are obtained from one or more flat haul road segments within the same site and using the same vehicle, in which EFH is to be computed.

The one or more stored or determined flat haul fuel efficiency baselines may be logged and analyzed on board the vehicle or may be logged on the vehicle and then delivered via communication network 130 to the vehicle-remote side 135 of the system for analysis. When it is desired to analyze EFH, the system is reconfigured to EFH mode. Initiating EFH mode may be either by way of an external command or by sensing a selected condition. A selected condition may be detection of the vehicle starting on a sloped road segment, detection of the vehicle dumping or receiving a load, detection of the vehicle passing a check point, etc. When a route of interest is identified 215 and EFH mode is initiated, the system records 214 the fuel used and the distance travelled for that route. The system can filter the fuel consumption to only that amount used while the vehicle is moving. The total amount of fuel used is compared against the flat haul efficiency baseline to determine EFH 216 for the route. In particular,

Fuel use (L) / Flat haul efficiency baseline (L/km) = Effective Flat Haul (km).

Once an EFH distance is Icnown for a particular route, the EFH can be assessed 218 as to whether the haul route is acceptable. Assessment 218 can be conducted manually or, more efficiently, controller 158 or the vehicle-remote side of the system 135 can assess the EFH.

The difference between the EFH distance and the actual distance traveled provides insights into how suitable a route is. For example, an EFH of 10 km on a 10 km haul route indicates this is an efficient route: the route is either flat or consumes fuel at the same average rate as if it were flat (i.e. it may be a road with a net decline and some uphill segments, and might have an EFH distance close to its actual distance). In another example, an EFH of 10 km on a 1 km haul route indicates that a route is very fuel intensive. Ultimately, suitability of a route depends on a subscriber's selected threshold level but assessment may further consider site conditions such as net elevation change, payload weight and slope (uphill and downhill) data to explain why an EFH deviates from actual haul distance. For example, if the EFH is 10X the actual distance but the vehicle climbed 400 meters on the trip, it will inform the decision as to the acceptability of the EFH. After assessment, the assessment results can be reported 220. The report can be stored for pick up by the subscriber or the report can be communicated to the subscriber, according to the system selections. The nature of the result and report can vary. For example, if the EFH exceeds a threshold level, a report such as an alarm can be generated of a haul route deficiency. If, on the other hand, the EFH is below the threshold level, it may be determined that the condition of the haul route is acceptable. It is contemplated that the haul route analysis may be performed for the entire haul route or individual segments of the haul route, to identify problematic portions of the haul route. A report that captures increases in the effective flat haul would be useful for triggering route redesign and maintenance. Of course, the EFH results may be correlated with other data to allow the system or the subscriber to manage their haul routes and work site. For example, criteria may be established relating the actual distance to the effective flat haul, and then factoring in net vertical travel to determine if the above relationship is appropriate.

The EFH can be determined again 222 for the same or a different route as the vehicle continues to travel around the work site.

Using the work site management system 104 as described above, the method could also report on other metrics such as one or more of average route slope, route slope profile, net elevation change, maximum and minimum fuel burn rates, feed and return fuel rates, fuel temperatures, fuel tank level, emissions, fleet usage, etc.

When considering EFH, there can be analysis, through controller 158 or analyzer 150, to compare data from fuel meters 151a, 151b and device 152 for vehicle network integration to exclude fuel use that may occur while the vehicle is not moving, isolate the fuel burn during load and dump as this is not affected by the travel between these events and/or detect load weight to automatically detect a loaded section of a haul route by examining the changing value of load weight in the truck box/tray. For example, vehicle integration data can be used to pause data acquisition if a vehicle comes to a stop while moving along a haul route segment that is being assessed for EFH. Other data available on the vehicle network provided through device 152, for example the loading or unloading of a haul truck tray, could be used to trigger the start and end of EFH data capture.

Inclinometer/slope sensor 154 data can be used to differentiate between flat and sloped sections of routes, which is important for identifying the fuel efficiency (L/km) on flat roads needed for the equivalence calculation. Location sensor 156 can be used to connect the EFH data to geographical locations on the route travelled. This will be most important when the routes are automatically identified. Again with respect to location data, while this data is not crucial for EFH calculations, it can be used to record the locations of the start and end positions for both EFH segments and actual flat haul baseline segments.

The motion sensor can detect changes in the ramp angle. Changes in ramp angle can also be used to automatically trigger EFH data acquisition. Knowing the angle of a ramped haul route segment and its effective flat haul by fuel helps work site planners compare the cost of travelling up a ramp of a certain grade and length. This could be used for planning future routes such as setting the angle of future ramps.

The controller includes an altimeter that can be used to compute gross and net vertical travel across a baseline or EFH segment.

The EFH can be processed on board the vehicle or via the vehicle-remote side of the system 135, as desired. To do so, fuel flow rates and totals are computed based on incoming sensor signals from the meters 151a, 151b. Flat sections are identified for obtaining flat haul baselines.

The system may autonomously identify flat roads and ramps used as segments for obtaining performance data for which EFH distance by fuel is to be computed. The identification of both flat and sloped road segments may be according to acceptance criteria established in the software. If the system is to automatically establish one or more baselines and/or one or more slopes, acceptance criteria for a suitable flat and sloped segments must be defined in the system. For example, a flat segment might be defined as road of a particular length, for example, greater than 300 meters, during which the pitch of the vehicle never deviates from a particular slope, such as for example +/- 2 degrees. Similarly, if the system is to auto detect sloped segments of roads, the system must include acceptance criteria for the automatic detection of a sloped segments, such as greater than 300 meters and an average grade greater than 5% or may not include a section of road wherein the slope is less than 2 degrees for longer than 30 meters. The acceptance criteria can be input to the control systems, such as the software for controller 158 and the controller monitors the sensors 121 to determine when the criteria are met and therefore when the performance data for that segment should be recorded for consideration of EFH.

Acceptance criteria are useful to automatically identify the portion of data relevant to the analysis of a baseline or a route under EFH consideration. The acceptance criteria allows the system to determine what portion of data is relevant to a baseline or a ramp. In an automatic system, data may be logged substantially continuously, for example at regular intervals, but the data may only be analyzed if it is identified by acceptance criteria as being within the resulting from a suitable flat or suitable ramped route. In one embodiment for example, in the case of a baseline calculation, a fuel consumption value and an odometer value may be recorded when route slope is detected in a flat range, such as for example, +/- 2 degrees, compared to previous slope data. When the slope deviates outside the selected criteria for flat, such as greater than 2 degrees either way, the software again records the odometer value and fuel value. The odometer values allows the system to determine if the section of flat road was sufficiently long. If so, the data regarding fuel consumption over the interval (fuel value end minus fuel value start) and distance over the interval (odometer end minus odometer start) along with other possible parameters are recorded for calculation of the baseline. In one embodiment, for example, the net vertical travel data may also be recorded if it was determined that the road segment sloped up steadily but within the flat range, as it may be useful to reassess the limits defining the flat range. Similar techniques may be used for sloped route segments. Data logged from the vehicle may be discarded where acceptance criteria such as slope or distance limits are not met.

Alternately or in addition, the system identifies mine process events, such as loading, dumping, etc. that will start and end segments for which EFH distance by fuel is to be computed.

Alternately or in addition, the system identifies vehicle location and automatically identifies data for selected route segments based on vehicle locations for which EFH distance by fuel is to be computed.

The system also captures relevant data related to EFH segments and EFH baseline segments such as total fuel consumed, total distance, start and end times, GPS location of start and end points, net elevation change, total elevation change, measured average segment incline and/or measured maximum segment incline.

Again, the EFH distance based on fuel is computed on-board or the vehicle remote side 135 by comparing the fuel use and distance from a baseline segment to the fuel use and distance of the EFH fuel segment under consideration. The baseline segment employed may be an average, a most recent or a 'most relevant'. Baseline relevance may be based on proximity in time, but could also be based on having similar vehicle operating parameters for the segments, such as tray tonnage, or ambient conditions. In particular, to compute effective flat haul, the fuel consumption on a route under consideration is compared to the distance travelled on a flat road using the same fuel. However, not all baseline values from flat road segments are the same: they are travelled under different load conditions, at different times, in different locations, etc. Thus, the system may consider the current conditions of one or more of time, location, payload, etc. and may select the most relevant baseline segment to be computed against the route under consideration to determine EFH.

As noted, the system includes the on board side and the vehicle remote side and the foregoing operations can be conducted on board the vehicle entirely or along with the vehicle remote side. Generally, the controller on board the vehicle determines or responds according to storage and delivery schemes for retaining and transmitting data back to the vehicle-remote side of the system 135. While data may be stored long term and analyzed on board, generally long term storage and analysis of data is carried out externally of the vehicle in vehicle-remote side of the system 135. Beyond this, the remote side of the system 135 is also used for reporting, such as by an alarm, presentation, etc.

Fuel consumption data may have other uses in a work site management system. A direct measurement of fuel consumed is the probably the best practical measure of greenhouse gas emissions from an engine, as well as all other forms of harmful engine emissions (particulates, NO _x etc.). Also, if every piece of machinery were instrumented with fuel meters, or a reliable method of extrapolating site wide fuel consumption from the subset of instrumented vehicles, we would have a very good tool to quantify emissions across a worksite or an organization.

Alternatively, if a limit on emissions or fuel for a type of vehicle were established, this could easily be converted into a limit of the number of flat haul kilometers. Then, the effective flat haul by fuel values could be used to keep track of the number of flat haul equivalent distance driven, or this limit could be used to plan vehicle routing within the mine for the period of operation.

The previous description of the disclosed embodiments is provided to enable any person skilled in the art to make or use the present invention. Various modifications to those embodiments will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art, and the generic principles defined herein may be applied to other embodiments without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention. Thus, the present invention is not intended to be limited to the embodiments shown herein, but is to be accorded the full scope consistent with the claims, wherein reference to an element in the singular, such as by use of the article "a" or "an" is not intended to mean "one and only one" unless specifically so stated, but rather "one or more". All structural and functional equivalents to the elements of the various embodiments described throughout the disclosure that are known or later come to be known to those of ordinary skill in the art are intended to be encompassed by the elements of the claims. Moreover, nothing disclosed herein is intended to be dedicated to the public regardless of whether such disclosure is explicitly recited in the claims. No claim element is to be construed under the provisions of 35 USC 112, sixth paragraph, unless the element is expressly recited using the phrase "means for" or "step for".