The Environmental Protection Agency’s upcoming emission rules for big rig trucks could be a heavy lift for the agency.
That’s because it is seeking to appease both the industry and environmentalists by harmonizing the regulations with California’s more stringent standards.
“EPA is trying to play a balancing act” among business, environmentalists and California, which already has standards for heavy-duty trucks, said Kerry Kelly, senior federal affairs director for Waste Management, a major owner and operator of big rig trucks.
Kelly says the industry wants one regulation across all 50 states.
The industry doesn’t want to comply with one set of standards in California and a separate set of federal standards for the rest of the country. That would become complicated for operators that travel cross-country and manufacturers that would have to sell different products in California than in the rest of the country, according to Kelly and other industry officials.
The rules were expected to be issued in the beginning of June, but likely will be delayed until later in the month, although industry officials say it is hard to predict what the EPA will do.
Observers say the agency’s release of politically sensitive regulations in recent weeks, including the Renewable Fuel Standard and the Waters of the United States rules were big, and the agency is looking for some breathing room to space out new proposals.
The new truck rules are part of President Obama’s Climate Action Plan to fight the threat of climate change by reducing greenhouse gas emissions that scientists say are causing the climate to warm.
Jamie Scarcelli, vice president of composites with Wabash, one of the largest makers of truck trailers, said he is hearing from the agency that the rules will be out sometime before June 30.
“We were told first on June 1,” he said. But now “we are hopeful it comes out in June … hopefully by the end of this month … [and] go in place by April of next year,” he says.
Scarcelli says when the EPA approached the industry about regulating un-motorized trailers, the agency had a learning curve. “They learned that the trailer industry is more complicated” than at first glance, and a one-size-fits-all approach won’t work because of the range of differences in designs and uses of trailers.
Most of the industry sectors involved in helping EPA craft the rules have been satisfied with the agency’s level of outreach, but Scarcelli says he will be looking closely at the rules when they are issued to determine if they are achievable.
He said his first reaction to the idea of regulating trailers was the “trailer is not a motorized vehicle … and shouldn’t be included” in the regulations. But he came to understand that the trailer will be treated “as a combined item,” with “a separate standard” from the truck that hauls it.
Many of the items that Wabash is already adding to its trailers will be included in the regulations, and steadily increased over a decade, he said. Many of the items that EPA will require trailers to add to reduce truck fuel use can become very expensive, but he is confident that the “level of stringency” will be “relatively easy to comply with … and achievable” in the beginning stage of the rule, which would start in model-year 2018.
The EPA wants “to encourage” as much adoption of aerodynamic technology as possible in new trucks and trailers, Scarcelli said. The effort is partly to get the added benefits of reduced fuel consumption and greater mileage, but it is also to encourage California to adopt the standards in an attempt to harmonize the entire country under one truck rule.
The Golden State already has a truck standard that includes the entire truck and trailer assembly to increase fuel efficiency and reduce air pollution and carbon dioxide emissions.
Kelly explains that she thinks California would adopt the standards.
She also wants the rules to support truck users’ goals of switching out their diesel trucks to use increasing amounts of alternative fuels such as natural gas and landfill-based biogas.
“One of the key messages … we hope this rule [will include] will allow us to continue converting our fleet to natural gas,” Kelly said. She says 90 percent of the company’s new truck purchases will be natural gas trucks. Natural gas reduces sulfur dioxide and other pollutants, while achieving about a 20 percent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions, she said.
