trucking legislation

Workforce Legislation for Young Drivers Introduced by Senate

May 31, 2021 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

Logistics manager controlling truck driver schedule

“Today, 18-year-olds can drive more than 200 miles from New Albany to Gary and back, but they aren’t allowed to drive two miles from New Albany to Louisville,” said Senator Todd Young, who also serves as a member of the trucking policy-overseeing Commerce Committee. “The DRIVE-Safe Act will eliminate this ridiculous regulation and, in doing so, [will] address the driver shortage while providing new career opportunities for young Hoosiers.”

There have, until recently, been widespread restrictions for truck drivers under than age of 21 to operate trucks within interstate commerce, and many groups throughout the trucking industry have been working to relax those regulations in an effort to introduce more drivers into the workforce and help combat the national truck driver shortage. This shortage has been high on the list of trucking industry concerns for quite some time.

Recently, senators released legislation that would allow truckers younger than 21 to operate across state lines. The bill has been named the Developing Responsible Individuals for a Vibrant Economy (DRIVE-Safe) Act, and has been backed strongly by Senator Young.

“The DRIVE Safe Act, which has strong bipartisan support in both the House and the Senate, will expand job opportunities in trucking while also enhancing safety training and technology standards,” said American Trucking Associations recently in a tweet.

Young first introduced a version of this bill at a prior congressional session, but the legislation did not make it to the desk of the president. He has now reintroduced this bill to Congress with the support of Senators Kyrsten Sinema, Tom Cotton, Jerry Moran, Angus King, Jim Inhofe, and Joe Manchin–all co-sponsors of the bill.

The bill will focus on boosting employment opportunities and safety training for these young truckers, and would work to implement specific apprenticeship programs that would help all commercial driver license holders who are younger than 21 become able to haul shipments between different states via commercial motor vehicles.

“Now, more than ever, young Montanans need more opportunities to get comprehensive job training, access higher-paying work, and grow their careers early on,” said bill co-sponsor, Senator Jon Tester. “This bipartisan bill will do just that, allowing younger truckers to get top-of-the-line apprenticeships that kick their careers into gear, all while providing a big boost to the thousands of communities across the Big Sky who rely almost exclusively on trucks to move goods in and out of the state.”

Besides the partial solution that this bill would bring to the truck driver shortage, one major benefit, according to the bill’s supporters, is the economic boost it could bring to the country’s supply chain.

The current driver shortage has been a major factor in the nation’s economic struggles, Young explained.

“A strong domestic supply chain is essential for a competitive national economy, and the efficiency of the domestic supply chain is contingent upon the efficiency of our transportation networks,” Young said. “I’m concerned about the trucking industry’s growing driver shortage and its impact on the resilience of our domestic supply chain.”

American Trucking Associations has warned that the driver shortage is likely to continue at an incline over the next few years, with the rising demand in e-commerce (which skyrocketed during the pandemic’s stay-at-home orders) and growing numbers of trucking retirees being the largest causes.

According to ATA, the trucking industry will need to bring onboard an additional 1.1 million new truck drivers–or around 110,000 annually–over the next ten years if it wants to meet the demands of the country.

“This bill has strong, bipartisan backing because it’s both common sense and pro-safety,” said President of ATA, Chris Spear. “It raises the bar for training standards and safety technology far above what is asked of the thousands of under-21 drivers who are already legally driving commercial vehicles in 49 states today. The DRIVE-Safe Act is not a path to allow every young person to drive across state lines, but it envisions creating a safety-centered process for identifying, training, and empowering the safest, most responsible 18- to 20-year-olds to more fully participate in our industry.”

How Trucking is Making Major Moves with Electrification

May 28, 2021 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

Toned Trailer truck with glow and motion blur 3d rendering

The electrification of trucks and buses is finally becoming more mainstream than ever as efforts to reach nationwide goals regarding clean air continue to progress. Although electric passenger cars are the vehicles generating the most revenue out of all electric vehicle sales, the Environmental Defense Fund explained that the usage of zero-emission trucks is gaining momentum.

The benefits from these kinds of trucks are persuading shippers, manufacturers, and environmental activists to strongly support these efforts, and these groups are urging the trucking industry to find the quickest and most efficient ways to increase implementation of non-diesel-powered vehicles.

“Eliminating tailpipe pollution from these vehicles is also essential to help meet our nation’s climate goals,” said the Environmental Defense Fund in its recent report. “Our nation must adopt air pollution standards that ensure that all new sales of medium- and heavy-duty trucks and buses are zero-emission vehicles by 2040 at the latest.”

On the same day that nearly two dozen companies and business groups released a letter requesting that the California Air Resources Board begin taking a serious approach to establishing rules requiring that trucks become electric throughout the state, the Environmental Defense Fund study released its report.

“California has already established itself as an epicenter of the clean energy economy, with nearly 540,000 clean energy workers,” said the letter written by these businesses. “That figure includes almost 40,000 clean vehicle jobs, which covers jobs in electric and hybrid vehicle manufacturing, repair and maintenance, wholesale trade, and professional service in California’s core EV industries.”

California is part of a 15-state coalition working together to ensure all heavy-duty commercial trucks are powered by clean energy by 2050, and has been working to mandate the usage of electric trucks itself. Its in-state efforts will begin in 2024, with current plans for clean-air initiatives progressing into 2045.

“Today, we are testing 78 zero-emission heavy-duty trucks,” explained Gene Seroka, Executive Director of the Port of Los Angeles. “They’re either on the road or being assembled right now. What’s encouraging is that, after more than a decade of proofs-of-concept and demonstrations, we are starting to have real discussions with truck manufacturers about what it will take to make a zero-emission equipment market here in Los Angeles. Our goal is to have this recruitment deployed first at the Port of Los Angeles.”

FedEx, to the approval of many environmental activist groups, announced last month that it would be investing an initial amount of $2 billion into efforts to begin purchasing electric vehicles by the year 2025, with a target goal of converting its entire FedEx Express delivery fleet to solely carbon-neutral vehicles by 2040.

“FedEx trucks pass through neighborhoods across the nation, making this announcement an important step toward better air quality and climate action,” said Sierra Club’s Clean Transportation for All campaign director, Gina Coplon-Newfield. “The momentum to electrify delivery trucks is on, and we urge FedEx to move as quickly as possible to get to a 100% electric fleet.”

Many other carriers have recently made announcements that they are working to implement electric trucks into their own fleets, including Walmart. In September 2020, Walmart announced that it would be working to make all of its tractors electric– it currently has a fleet of 7,400 vehicles. This goal includes its long-haul trucks, and the company has noted that it will aim to reach zero overall carbon emissions–throughout all of its global operations–by 2040.

Canada’s Walmart division is also making major clean energy efforts, committing to converting nearly a quarter of its fleet to become electrically powered by the end of next year–and progressing to using completely clean energy by the year 2028. Specifically, it will be increasing its possession of the Tesla Semi–which is battery-electric–to 130 trucks.

Dependable Highway Express, NFI Industries, Penske Truck Leasing, and Knight-Swift Transportation Holdings have all expressed their intentions to implement electric heavy-duty trucks into their fleets, with Knight-Swift already deploying a Freightliner Cascadia tractor, its first battery-electric truck. The company’s goal is to reduce its carbon emissions by half by the year 2035.

More trucking companies are jumping onboard this trend, like Cummins Inc. and Navistar, who have begun to collaborate in the manufacturing of their own unique Class 8 truck through U.S. Department of Energy grant funds to create a vehicle powered by hydrogen fuel cells.

Finally, Amazon Inc. announced its plans to operate 10,000 electric vans throughout the United States in Europe by next year, and 100,000 completely electric delivery vans by 2030. These delivery vans are manufactured by Rivian, a zero-emission manufacturer whose vehicles will be used by Amazon to make deliveries as soon as this year.

Biden Calls for Environmental Justice in Aftermath of Trump Era

May 26, 2021 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

“Environmental justice” is at the forefront of executive orders made by President Joe Biden in the aftermath of the Trump administration’s environmental regulations. A priority of these efforts will be actions helping to reduce overall emissions of greenhouse gasses, especially within minority communities through which many trucks haul their shipments.

“The policy is sprinkled into everything this administration is going to do,” explained American Trucking Associations energy and environmental affairs counsel, Glen Kedzie. “Our industry needs to get to know the term. We frequent ports, rail yards, warehouses, and inner cities as part of our conducting business.”

According to Kedzie, these orders will pertain to the continuation of reduction efforts within regions across the United States that have seen many negative health aspects as a result of pollution from GHG levels, particulate matter, and nitrogen oxides from heavy trucking activity. Thus, the trucking industry will experience many changes and boosted pressure to make environmentally healthier changes–quickly.

Luckily, the trucking industry as a whole has worked hard throughout recent years to reduce its carbon footprint and to comply with regulatory changes surrounding the issue of greenhouse gas emissions since 2007. These efforts include participation in the Environmental Protection Agency’s SmartWay Program, as well as compliance within its Phase 1 and Phase 2 GHG regulation updates, Kedzie added.

Biden’s January executive order calling for environmental justice prioritization pledged that the regulatory change would hold high standards for pollution sources across the country, particularly for sources that “disproportionately harm communities of color and low-income communities.”

According to the official executive order, “the federal government has failed to meet that commitment in the past, [and] it must advance environmental justice.”

This change is going to be a “big thing for us,” Kedzie said of the trucking industry, noting that workers within the trucking sector should work diligently to participate in these green efforts, especially because the order will allow the Biden administration to have broader oversight over all sources of energy and pollution production, including both stationary and mobile components.

“If we don’t [participate’ voluntarily], the administration is going to [carry out these efforts] through regulatory and mandatory measures,” Kedzie said.

To progress with an easier, more widespread adoption of zero-emission technology, the trucking industry will need proper inducements, explained clean transportation advocate at GreenLatinos, Andrea Marpillero-Colomina.

“I think that the major issue with the trucking industry is that there are no incentives,” she explained, adding that cost-effective business mindsets will cause the trucking industry to continue using its fossil fuel-powered vehicles for as long as it can until it feels persuaded to make environmentally-friendly changes.

Forcing those changes, though, may be less productive than one may expect, Marpillero-Colomina noted.

“I don’t think it’s going to be effective. It’s not going to win any allies to point fingers at the trucking industry and say, ‘You guys are responsible for this,’” she said.

Efficient communication between government officials and trucking companies is key in this case, added transportation analyst for the Natural Resources Defense Council, Patricio Portillo.

“There needs to be close collaboration between the state regulatory agencies and motor carriers so there can be a lot of back and forth in terms of what’s needed,” he said.

California-based environmental researcher for ATA, Mike Tunnell, agreed, explaining that because fleets have already made major changes over the last several years, we should be able to assume that future clean air efforts will be much easier moving forward.

“The industry has come a long way in the last decade or so, and we’ll see how the [EPA’s] Clean Trucks initiative will play out,” Tunnel said. “Then the question becomes, ‘How much is enough?’ At the end of the day, if you end up with an all-electric fleet, does this issue go away? Or is it really a matter of trucks in your neighborhood?”

Still, he believes these actions will continue to snowball in the coming years.

“It sounds like the administration is making environmental justice a priority with trucks operating in or near some of these communities,” he said. “That will definitely be looked at as a potential source of emissions. I think we can expect more activity in this area.”

Green Transportation Bills Backed by Sen. Markey

May 25, 2021 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

“Business-as-usual is building bad highways and breaking our planet–we can build smarter, safer, and healthier systems if we factor climate impacts and emissions into our decision-making process,” said Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts. Markey is currently working with other Democratic senators to implement new greenhouse gas emission-reducing legislation.

This bill, named the Generating Resilient (and) Environmentally-Exceptional National–or ‘GREEN’–Streets Act, and would boost state standards in relation to greenhouse gas emissions throughout America’s roadways and regarding vehicles’ per capita miles traveled.

“I’m reintroducing the GREEN Streets Act with [Senator Tom Carper] and [Representative Jared Huffman] to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the national highway system and help states adapt to the adverse effects of climate change,” Markey said recently in a tweet.

Markey also works as a member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, which overlooks policies in regards to surface transportation.

“We can advance the goals of clean energy, climate process, and healthy communities, as well as fortify ourselves against the adverse impacts of climate change,” Markey continued. “An essential component of that effort is to re-envision how we plan for, construct, and maintain our national highway system, [by] using climate measures that matter, and [ensuring] that we hold systems accountable.”

This new legislation would work to push for minimum state agency standards to be established at the hands of the transportation secretary. These standards, which would prioritize the overall decline of greenhouse gas emission allowance and per capita vehicle miles traveled, would also call for state reduction and assessment metrics.

Ideally, states would be able to delegate specific highway funding for compliance, and be required, along with Metropolitan Planning Organizations, to permit strategies and infrastructure projects that could help them bring about vehicle miles traveled-reducing and emissions-reducing capabilities throughout the entire transportation industry.

“When we look at building back better and addressing climate change, our nation’s highways present us with an incredible opportunity,” noted Environment and Public Works Committee chairman, Senator Tom Carper of Delaware. “We need to establish bold goals for reducing transportation emissions and to deliver safe, reliable, zero-emission travel choices for the public. Our bill would set the bar for states to encourage them to reduce vehicles emissions while improving health and reducing congestion in the process.”

In addition to the GREEN Bill, Markey proposed further legislation–the Connecting America’s Active Transportation System Act, which would seek an annual grant of $500 million for state, regional, and local agencies alike to work toward a focus upon biking and pedestrian-friendly infrastructure. A big upswing in non-vehicle mobility could lead to a much larger reduction of emission pollution and traffic congestion–as well as boosted safety for these kinds of travelers–according to supporters of the bill.

“Pedestrian and bicyclist fatalities are on the rise, and expanding active transportation networks will help address the national safety crisis on our streets,” explained Markey.

Sufficient federal funding would also allow for a wider range of transportation possibilities to become more accessible for everyone, he added.

“At the same time, significant federal investment in active transportation will help address the climate crisis by reducing driving emissions, as well as ensure that all individuals, no matter their age or ability, can reach their destinations through affordable and healthy travel options,” Markey continued.

Many of these bills’ supporters note that the current infrastructure and emissions issues in their particular states are especially in need of modern, healthier, and more universally-beneficial upgrades.

“Alaska’s transportation systems are in need of expansion, and building and connecting pedestrian and trail networks [are] an important part of bringing our infrastructure into the 21st century,” said Alaska Senator Dan Sullivan. “This legislation will provide opportunities to compete for significant funding to complete and further expand trails.”

Other backers of Markey’s bills include co-sponsors such as Senators Alex Padilla of California, Dianne Feinstein of California, Dick Durbin of Illinois, Jeffrey Merkley of Oregon, and Bernie Sanders; as well as house sponsors like Representatives Grace Napolitano of California, Bill Foster of Illinois, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, and Emanuel Cleaver of Missouri.

Safety Advocates Join ATA in Pushing for Speed Limiter Rule

May 24, 2021 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

Speed limiter support is a main focus in the recent letter sent to Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg from American Trucking Associations and Road Safe America, a group of safety advocates.

In the letter, which outlined the groups’ push for Congressional and Department of Transportation policymakers to put in place new speed limiter guidelines, explained that the speed limiter rule originally written into a 2016 rulemaking proposal is due for some major updates. This idea is inspired mostly by the current plethora of automated driver-assist safety technology that has seen huge advancements in the last few years.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration created that 2016 proposal, which requested that all trucks, buses, and multipurpose vehicles with maximum vehicle weight ratings of at least 26,000 pounds have speed-limiting devices implemented onboard. With these heavy-weighing vehicles at hand, the proposal offered that maximum top speeds should be between 60 and 68 miles per hour.

Still, though, the proposal failed to mention the ATA-supported anti-tampering requirements for said speed limiters, as NPRM has had many concerns regarding these regulations–even though ATA was a supporter early-on in the speed-limiter conversation.

“When the Department of Transportation initially published the 2016 notice of proposed rulemaking, ATA and many other carriers shared several concerns about the efficacy of a one-size-fits-all solution applied to a sector as complex and nuanced as trucking,” wrote Steve Owings, president of Road Safe America, and Chris Spear, President of ATA, in their letter to Buttigieg in March. “Foremost among them were the unintended and potentially dangerous consequences of limiting commercial drivers to one universal speed limit despite the varying limits set for passenger vehicles on interstate and secondary roads. Another question was how such a rule would adapt to the rapid evolution taking place in vehicle safety technology.”

These kinds of technological changes in the trucking world have allowed more and more fleets to easily utilize high-quality, highly-efficient automated safety tech, which has made ATA begin to “support new and safer approaches to speed management,” according to the letter. Therefore, all methods of speed limiting should take into account any current “21st century solution” that would be able “to ensure maximum adaptability” for a motor carrier–especially as the adoption of integrated safety technology among fleets is happening more quickly than ever before.

ATA has been working to secure a speed limiter rule since 2006, when it first urged FMCSA to implement a new regulation–a proposal which was initially supported by the agency. However, many questions quickly arose in regards to the lack of helpful data and a “flawed” method to limiting overall speeds.

“The world has changed so much since 2006,” said Bill Sullivan, executive vice president of ATA. “In 2016, 2018, [and] 2020, technology [had] become such a huge part of how motor carriers manage safety for their trucks.”

This isn’t the first proposal for updated speed limiter regulations in recent years, either–in December 2019, many safety advocacy groups, including Road Safe America, heavily supported the Cullum Owings Large Truck Safe Operating Speed Act. This bill, proposed in the Senate, was named for Steve Owings’ son, who died when a cruise-control-operating tractor-trailer struck his car in 2002.

This 2019 legislation “promoted incentives to drive adoption and use of newer technologies” while allowing the Department of Transportation to be able to ”continually review and update technology requirements to guard against obsolescence,” the letter explained.

“We’re continuing to figure out exactly what our strategy is going to be, along with others who are supportive of this,” said Owings of the 2021 proposal. “We’ve got a pretty big coalition. We’re going to continue to push for this common-sense change both in the regulatory arena and the legislative [arena].”

Although speed limiters are not a new tool, there are now many more possibilities for their usage, as they can work in tandem with automatic emergency braking, adaptive cruise control, and other automated safety tech to boost a fleet’s safety capabilities.

“Speed is a component of safety, but now it’s only one tool in a suite of technologies that we have,” Sullivan noted. “Speed limiting is a fundamental component of safety management. ATA’s policies support speed limiting, and we need to make sure that it’s done in a way that accommodates the changes in equipment and technology.”

Confidence Report Updates Show Truck Lightweighting Will Become More Common

May 23, 2021 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

A recently-updated confidence report from the North American Council for Freight Efficiency is predicting that North American Class 8 trucking will be undergoing much more lightweighting with the implementation of more and more electric trucks on America’s roadways.

Currently, many truck buyers have been shifting towards lightweighting incrementally while others may already require it, but, according to the Lightweighting Confidence Report’s updates, these efforts may begin increasing steadily.

“The key is that lightweighting is not a fuel economy option like it is in cars,” said Mike Roeth, Executive Director of NACFE. “It’s a payload play. It’s freight-ton-per-mile efficiency. Do enough of that, and you could have fewer trucks on the road, less congestion–that’s a good thing.”

However, fleets have to be diligent about when and how they begin the process of lightweighting their trucks.

“If a fleet spends money to lightweight but doesn’t get more freight, then [it has] lost money,” Roeth added.

The report noted, primarily, that freight is becoming denser, shippers are loading more pallets onto trailers, and overall tractor and trailer weights have been on steadily increasing.

On America’s roadways, a large majority of trucks are dry van units, which only travel at maximum weight 2% of the time due to goods filling out trailer volume before meeting maximum weight or because routes are not ideal for hauling a grossed-out trailer volume, according to the report.

Now, NACFE expects that shippers will begin asking fleets to have trucks loaded to maximum weight–80,000 pounds–on 20% of their shipments instead of just 10%. Maxed-out trucks currently make up only about one-tenth of big-rigs on the road. Therefore, shippers will likely request that dry van units boost their maximum load on 4% of their hauls, double from the current average of 2%.

Bulk haulers, or fleets that typically reach maximum weigh on most shipments, only make up about 2% of trucking overall, Roeth noted. If these haulers utilize technology that can help reduce their weight by 500 pounds, they could save around $5,500 upfront.

“A good metric for the value of lightweighting technologies is dollar of upfront cost per pound of weight saved,” the report said. “For example, average bulk carriers will pay $6 to $11 [per round] for a component that weighs less, reefer- or certain dry van- dedicated routes [is] $2 to $5, and general dry van freight is $0 to $2.”

Originally, when NACFE first released its report in 2015, it believed more fleets would be reaching maximum weight limits more often “because packaging would get denser, load matching and digital brokers [would] get more freight on trucks, and the trucks were getting heavier because of more emissions components and driver amenities and aerodynamic devices,” Roeth said. These added components have increased average weights by 1,000 pounds throughout the last ten years.

“That trend, we think, still exists, it’s just a little slower,” Roeth continued. “And the truck builders have done a pretty good job of lightweighting their [bases, standards, and] trucks to help with the extra weight they added through the 2000s.”

Since 2015, trucks have been able to drop five pounds of weight by installing steel and aluminum wheels, as well as utilizing new innovations regarding cab, mount, and frame structures, Roeth explained.

“These options are out there and the supply chain is kind of ready to build them when they have to, and we think it is going to happen over time,” said Roeth, who added that truck manufacturers may begin selling newer lightweight features that have been in the works.

Some obstacles regarding the industry’s ease into efficient lightweighting include the current shift from diesel-run trucks to those that are hydrogen-electric or battery-electric. For the same shipment, an electric truck can be 2,500 to 5,000 pounds heavier than a diesel truck.

Many may think that a viable option would be converting existing diesel trucks into ones running on electric batteries, but that would mean there would be “less [of an] opportunity to try to take that weight out…at least in the first generation,” Roeth noted.

Another caveat? According to Roeth, t’s still much easier to haul heavy freight with two trucks–keeping them both under weight limits–than trying to lightweight a large load with just one truck.