If you’re green but also a daily car commuter you may think there’s nothing you can do to drive greener. You couldn’t be more wrong – here’s 5 tips that will save you money and reduce your carbon footprint. GOFAR can also be your fuel tracker! 1. You can’t manage what you can’t measure – get a fuel tracker! Pretty obvious but if you want to improve you start by measuring. Here’s the options.. Pen and paper. Cheap but a chore for most people. Digital is better so at least use Excel. A fuel tracker app. Great if you’re disciplined about starting and stopping the app every drive. (I often forgot) A 3G device. Fleet solutions like Fleetmatics (c$40/month) plug straight into your car (or truck). Pricey though. A bluetooth dongle, like GOFAR. Reliable tracking but for a small one off cost and with no monthly fees. 2. Experiment with different routes Use a mapping app like Waze or Google Maps and see if you’re missing a trick. Make sure to keep notes about the routes though so you know what worked. GOFAR does this automatically – and you can even tag a trip with a route name if you want. You may find certain routes are geographically longer but quicker and you will use less fuel if you have a higher average speed and better economy. Flatter routes can be more efficient that lugging your 2 tonne car up a hill. 3. Sleep in and cut emissions by 37%! Can you go earlier? What about later? Do you really need to get to work at the same time as everybody else? Using automatic trip tracking and fuel tracker GOFAR we discovered that sleeping in (or working from home) for two hours cut emissions AND fuel costs by 37%. 4. Learn to eco drive Eco driving simply means not wasting your money, burning fuel you didn’t need to burn. It takes practice and alertness – which also keeps you safer on the road – no bad thing. And it’s a less stressful driving style too. The top tips? Leave a good space and scan ahead for obstacles and backed up traffic Coast as soon as you see an obstacle and naturally decelerate. Brake early but not heavily – the obstacle may clear before you get there and rolling starts are more efficient than standing starts (seen Nascar?) Don’t stress – it won’t help but might hurt Don’t speed – the GOFAR team all average 29.5kph to 30.3kph as we all work in Sydney. It’s really hard to beat the prevailing traffic speed and generally not worth the risk. Don’t dawdle – if you can go at a good lick then do so – slow speeds are less efficient Don’t idle – your fuel economy is infinitely bad when your engine is on and you’re going nowhere! Keep the revs low Watch cruise control on hills – you don’t want to use a lot of fuel to be at the speed limit at the peak as you’ll just have to brake it away Remember that braking – whilst essential – is the process of turning your money into heat. Try not to put yourself in positions where you’ll inevitably have to brake. 5. Get GOFAR in your car GOFAR serves as a fuel tracker and gives drivers real time feedback on their driving which rapidly helps them adjust to a smoother, more efficient driving style. The device, GOFAR Ray, is your fuel tracker indicator which uses subtle lights to let you know if you are using fuel properly or not. When GOFAR is blue you’re driving efficiently. As it starts to glow red, you’ve done some harsh braking or you’re accelerating too hard – GOFAR instantly lets you know so you can adjust. Real time feedback is how we learn best – it’s why we don’t touch irons twice! We all breath the same air, so wherever you live it’s worth driving greener. It’s a no brainer because you save on fuel money as well as pumping out less pollution that you, your friends, your family have to breath in. It can be hard to know how to drive greener sometimes though, so GOFAR gives you real time feedback from a fuel tracker that nudges you to a greener driving style. It’s simple and it works! The recent pollution in some Asian cities like Delhi or Beijing brings home how important it is to do everything possible to reduce what’s coming out our exhaust pipes. (And GOFAR works on diesel, hybrid and petrol cars too!) 6. And a bonus tip – offset your driving It’s best to reduce your emissions than simply offsetting them but an offset can be a way to at least know you’re driving carbon neutral once you’ve maximised emission reductions through improving your driving style. Top tip – carbon offsets make a lovely gift…! Give trees! Confirm GOFAR works in your car GOFAR works in all Australian petrol, diesel and electric hybrids since 2006, It works in all European petrol cars since 2001 and all European diesel cars since 2004 We work in all US cars since 1996 – that’s over 20 years! Still not sure if this means your car is supported? Most likely- it is. GOFAR works perfectly with your car model. However, it doesn’t hurt to check. Check my car compatibility Thanks for reading and I hope we can make driving better together.