Last Updated: May 22. 2010 1:00AM Obama seeks fuel efficiency standards for large trucks David Shepardson / Detroit News Washington Bureau Washington --President Barack Obama on Friday ordered work to begin on setting first-ever fuel-efficiency standards for heavy-duty trucks. He also called for progress toward establishing higher standards for cars and light trucks in model years 2017 through 2025. "It's possible in the next 20 years for vehicles to use half the fuel and produce half the pollution that they do today," Obama said at a Rose Garden ceremony where he signed a presidential memorandum. A 2007 energy law requires the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to set standards for medium- and heavy-duty trucks by 2016. Obama's directive also requires the Environmental Protection Agency to set limits on tailpipe emissions. Obama wants the rules done by July 2011. "This will bring down costs for transporting goods, serving businesses and consumers alike," Obama said. "This standard will spur growth in the clean-energy sector. We know how important that is." Large trucks consume more than 2 million barrels of oil daily, average 6.1 mpg and emit 20 percent of transportation-related greenhouse gas pollution. Obama said off-the-shelf technology could improve efficiency by 25 percent in tractor-trailers. Standing with the president in the Rose Garden Friday were the CEOs of Daimler Trucks North America, Volvo North America, Cummins Inc. and Navistar. Executives from major automakers were seated in the front row. Obama did not cite specific light vehicle standards for 2017 and beyond. But as a presidential candidate, he called for hiking fuel efficiency requirements to 50 miles per gallon by 2027, which would require about 4 percent annual increases after 2016. White House spokesman Matthew Lehrich wouldn't say if Obama is committed to that target, or quantify the annual increases that would be sought, calling it "premature to speculate." Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood told reporters, "We're at the starting game. Stay tuned." One question that remains is whether automakers and California can agree on how much future emissions should be cut. California has long pushed to set fuel economy standards in the state that exceed federal requirements, as it is allowed to do under the Clean Air Act. But automakers have fought the move, saying it would be too expensive to build vehicles to meet varying regulations. Mary Nichols, chairwoman of the California Air Resources Board, said the state wants 3 percent to 6 percent average annual increases from 2017 through 2025. "California envisions a path forward to arrive at aggressive light-duty vehicle greenhouse gas emissions and fuel economy standards," she said. The administration will hold discussions with automakers and California officials until September before setting a timetable for finalizing the new rules. Dan Becker, director of the Safe Climate Campaign, said "a tough new rule" is needed "that breaks our addiction to oil." He expects tough negotiations between automakers and California. The best news for automakers was that Obama wants to keep a national standard, "rather than a tangle of overlapping and uncertain rules." That way, Obama said, "auto companies will have clear incentive to develop more efficient vehicles." Last May, the White House struck a deal with the state of California and automakers to set national standards for 2012-16. California agreed to waive its right to set its own tailpipe emissions limits because the federal government essentially adopted them as the national standard. The deal sets fleet-wide fuel economy requirements at 34.1 mpg by 2016 -- about a 40 percent hike over current levels. Those regulations will cost automakers $51.5 billion over five years and add $985 to the price of an average vehicle in 2016. The next round of increases could cost even more, and require more hybrids and plug-in vehicles to meet the new rules. But California retains the right to set its own standards again in 2017. Automakers and Obama want a deal to head off separate state standards. "The federal government is looking 15 years down the road and uniting all the diverse stakeholders to work towards the same national goal," said Dave McCurdy, head of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, the trade group that represents Detroit's Big Three and Toyota Motor Corp. From The Detroit News: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/...ency-standards-for-large-trucks#ixzz0oquqHdU3
Anyone not seeing this coming had to be blind, deaf, and dumb. I think Caterpillar used a crystal ball when they decided to get out of the heavy truck engine market. Too much investment in R&D for too little return. This will mean more government oversight in every step of truck and engine manufacturing. CARB is still PO'd however, because they can just not simply outlaw the diesel engine, diesel being a four-letter word to CARB. I'm sure heavy truck and diesel engine economy will continue to improve as time goes by, but I seriously doubt that the percentages will meet the standards that Obama or CARB want. Light duty trucks, of which there are more and more on the road, well, I'm still amazed that the government didn't step in years ago to enforce higher economy standards on them. In the last two years, I've used a 2008 Duramax Chev, and a 1993 6.5T GMC, to pull a 28' Haulmark cargo trailer into eastern Arizona delivering auto parts and tires. The Duramax averaged around 10-11 MPG, the 6.5T about 7.5-8.5 MPG. That's the improvement in light duty pickup, transmission, and engine technology in 15 years.
If we are to believe that it is possible to cut the fuel usage of large trucks in half, then the way to accomplish that goal must be known now. So, if they know how to do it, why aren’t they doing it? What trucker would not want to cut their fuel cost in half?
The trucker will not save any money. The price of fuel will just double or triple. In the long run they will probably be worse off.
Referring to the higher mileage requirements for big trucks, this is quoted from the article in the first post: "This will bring down costs for transporting goods, serving businesses and consumers alike," Obama said. Better mileage will indeed reduce the cost of transportation, but not if the equipment cost of achieving the higher mileage is greater than the value of the fuel saved. With cars and SUVs, fuel economy can be increased simply by making them smaller. However, not everybody is willing to give up hauling capacity and safety for better gas mileage. But downsizing the vehicle makes no sense when it comes to big trucks. If you double the fuel mileage by cutting the weight in half, you need two trucks to do the job of one. It seems to me that if there were a way to increase fuel economy in the trucking business in a way that actually reduced costs, the industry would already be doing it in their own self-interest. However, what new government regulation is likely to do is raise the cost of trucking, resulting in that added cost being passed through to the consumer, and in turn inducing consumers to consume less. The larger goal of this government regulation is not to lower the cost of transportation, but rather, it is to fight global warming. And whether you believe in that goal or not, it has a cost, either in the form of higher prices or less consumption; meaning a smaller economy and less prosperous lifestyle. This all becomes rather apparent when you study the various government suggestions to save fuel, which include raising the fuel tax to encourage conservation, and lowering the speed limit.
Obama feels his approval rating dropping so he gets in front of the news media and spouts a lot of feel good crap to pacify the environmental movement. One only has to look at his record so far to see a lot of talk and few accomplishments. I don't see this getting through congress until some other technology becomes viable. There is growing alarm over the economy shut down because of the finance industry and the environmentalists are starting to show their true colors. The eco industry simply wants rake off a ransom from all industry to maintain their lifestyles. You can't legislate physics and maintain a social order!
I would guess that they will increase the max weight per truck and go with larger trailers to increase the Ton/miles per gallon. Then stand around patting each other on the back for such an innovative new idea.
Priced a 2010 Pete, $20,000 more than a 2009 model because of emision regs. So this is not only going to cost more but get worse fuel mileage. Now they want more regs, how much more is that going to cost? Sure could use Obama's bailout.
Yair...In 1962 I was moonlighting on a Foden with an eight cylinder Gardiner that did 6mpg (imperial) hauling sixty ton of railway line...it had 32mph diffs, does that tell you something?
Fuel efficiency standards It seems that they should be tring to reduce the friction in an engine as much as anything else? That and going to electronic two speed rear diff's.
That's it. They'll cut consumption in "half", and increase the cost per gallon to compensate for the loss of revenue in the oil industry. Nowhere in the future will a trucker experience the benefits of lower operating costs, due to "less consumption". Look at the latest era of engines since the introduction of low sulfur diesel (even before ULSD.) Old mechanical Cats & Cummins were averaging 5 to 5.5 mpg if driven right; since the inception of the newer emissions engines and ULSD fuel, they're lucky to see 4.8 mpg on a good day depending on the vocation. And Obama stated it will "lower the cost of transportation"....c'mon, give me a break here. Just what trucking business owners need to be sucessful...lower transportation rates. We made a decent living and enjoyed ourselves back when fuel in NJ was .95/gallon. That was over $2.00 ago...Since then it's become a nickel & dime, low return business. If you can even call it a business anymore. My definition of a business all my life was "an entity that performs a particular service for a "PROFIT"...slowly becoming non-existent in the trucking business. You'd have to really exert some serious effort in trying to convince me that they will be able to DOUBLE a class 8 truck engine's fuel mileage without drastically reducing the weight-to-horsepower ratios that they are currently at. How would they take an 80K lb. gross weight vehicle now averaging 6 mpg and majically increase it to 12 mpg without sacrificing performance, weight and ultimately safety? Don't most independent truckers wish there was a majic pill to do it already? Guys are experimenting with supplemental hydrogen generators (HHO,) higher gear ratios, lower rpm engines...aside from mounting a big sail on top of every rig, I'm not buying into this at all. Trucking is losing it's glamour little by little...Thanks to politics.:usa
110,000,000 gallons of diesel fuel burned daily by heavy trucks??? I'd love to see these numbers that are spouted verified just once by a reputable source. I see these claims all the time with no credit to their reference source. I agree with those here who have said the market would implement these improvements without government intervention. Trucking companies go to great lengths to save tenths of a mile per gallon of fuel, if these improvements were economically sound they'd already be in place. There will be no savings to us, the trucking companies will have to pass the cost of these "improvements" to the end user to stay solvent. The current SCR emissions system which utilizes the injection of urea into the exhaust to control nitrogen levels costs in excess of $10,000 per unit and requires that a urea reservoir be maintained on the truck, an added operating expense. The system also adds 2000 pounds to the weight of the truck, diminishing the payload capacity by the same amount, so it is now requiring a second truck to deliver the same payload total as previous to this change. If the government was really interested in reducing emissions, they would relax some of the laws governing trucking. As Orchard Ex mentioned, increasing the load capacity of existing trucks would reduce the number of trucks required to move goods around the country thereby reducing emissions as well. I truly believe that the EPA pulls these numbers they desire out of the air (or perhaps a darker place...) without any scientific input. Then, after they enact an unobtainable number, they can fine the manufacturers for not reaching it, which of course gets passed along to us all in higher transportation costs. The EPA needs to be reined in and quick.
This is another "See what I have done Dealio". Nothing is fixed but It sure looks good. Company I work for is based in Kansas.A Law was passed in Kansas that in order to bid on Kansas work the trucks used MUST have a catalytic converters on them. So the company has been retro fitting the trucks with converters. The cost of which will be passed along to ultimately the Kansas taxpayers. Don't get me wrong,I have made a TON of money moving cranes in and out of power plants to help build what is effectively huge catalytic converters for the boilers but that cost is handed down to the customer. It may never be known but I just wonder how rich this country could have been if the unneeded laws and policy's had never been enacted. These fuel mileage standards fall into the same category.Raise cost per unit.Raise maintenance costs.....Every bit of it will be passed on to the the average Joe.
Even if I didn't agree with this whole post, I would have to agree on the strength of that last sentence, which is my motto. On the subject of the first paragraph, they do that all the time. POWER magazine, (an electricity generation trade journal) just had an excellent article about the International Panel on Climate Change finally being made to release their peer review data for that infamous report. According to their analysis ,while there were over 2500 scientists involved as authors and peer reviewers in the whole multi-thousand page report, there were only 72 people involved in chapter 9, which is the only section that says it is caused by human activity. There were 10 authors listed for that chapter, and of the 62 peer reviewers who signed on over half were not scientists. Something to think about.