How do I calculate emissions from a refrigerated truck with a diesel refrigeration unit?

Add three parts: the truck engine's diesel x 2.68 kg CO2 per litre, the refrigeration unit's own diesel x 2.68, and any refrigerant topped up x its global warming potential. The refrigeration unit and refrigerant are what a dry-truck factor misses, so count them from fuel logs and service invoices.

The three parts of a reefer truck's emissions

• Engine: litres of diesel for the trip x 2.68 kg CO2 per litre.
• Transport refrigeration unit (TRU): if it has its own diesel engine and tank, its litres x 2.68. If you only have run hours, hours x the unit's litres per hour.
• Refrigerant: kg topped up in the year x the gas's GWP, shared across the year's trips. This is CO2e because the gas is an HFC, not CO2.

When the TRU has no separate fuel record

Some TRUs draw from the truck's main tank, and some log only engine hours. Use the manufacturer's fuel use per hour for your set point and ambient range, multiply by logged hours, and label it an estimate. Frozen loads at minus 18 degrees C in an Indian summer burn more than chilled loads at 2 to 8 degrees C, so do not use one rate for both. If the unit runs on shore power at the depot, that electricity is grid kWh x 0.710 kg CO2.

Refrigerant GWPs for common reefer gases

• R-404A: about 3,943 (IPCC AR5) or 4,728 (AR6), worked out from its blend of R-125, R-143a and R-134a.
• R-452A: about 1,945 (AR5) or 2,292 (AR6).
• R-134a: 1,300 (AR5) or 1,530 (AR6).
• State which assessment report you used and keep it the same for the year.

Whose scope it is

If you own or lease and operate the truck, engine fuel, TRU fuel and refrigerant leakage are all your Scope 1. If you are the shipper and a transporter runs the truck, the whole trip is your Scope 3, Category 4 or Category 9 depending on who pays for the freight. Ask the transporter for litres and top-up records per trip; a tonne-km estimate for a dry truck will understate a reefer.

Worked example: one 600 km frozen-food trip

• Engine diesel: 150 L x 2.68 = 402 kg CO2
• TRU: 20 hours x 1.5 L per hour (estimate) = 30 L; 30 x 2.68 = 80.4 kg CO2
• Refrigerant: 3 kg of R-404A topped up in the year over 150 trips = 0.02 kg per trip; 0.02 x 4,728 (AR6) = 94.6 kg CO2e
• Trip total: 402 + 80.4 + 94.6 = 577 kg CO2e

Here the refrigeration unit and the refrigerant together add about 44 percent on top of the engine. A truck with a leak problem can add far more.

What Senseible does here

Senseible reads truck diesel invoices at 2.68 kg CO2 per litre and refrigerant top-up invoices, and its logistics calculator estimates freight by tonne-km and truck class. TRU run hours and per-trip refrigerant shares are figures you record alongside.

• Truck freight factor per tonne-km, India
• Reefer container emissions
• Refrigerant top-up invoice to CO2e
• Logistics emissions calculator

Sources: GLEC Framework, Smart Freight Centre (temperature-controlled transport), IPCC AR6 WG1, Chapter 7 Supplementary Material, GWP100 values, IPCC 2006 Guidelines, Volume 2 Energy, mobile combustion

Last reviewed 2026-10-17.