WASHINGTON (AP) - Struggling with record diesel prices, the trucking
industry's main trade group on Thursday introduced a plan to reduce fuel
consumption and emissions over the next decade mainly by having its members slow
down.
The American Trucking Associations, whose members include FedEx Corp., UPS
Inc. and Con-way Inc., says adherence to a handful of new proposals will reduce
fuel consumption by 86 billion gallons and carbon dioxide emissions -- the main
culprit of climate change -- by 900 million tons for all vehicles over the next
10 years.
The recommendations are:
-- Limit the speed new trucks can travel to no more than 68 mph and reduce
the national speed limit to 65 mph for all vehicles.
-- Reduce engine idling.
-- Increase fuel efficiency through participation in an Environmental
Protection Agency partnership program.
-- Ease congestion by improving the nation's highways, through a fuels tax
increase if necessary.
-- Use more productive truck combinations.
-- Support national fuel economy standards for trucks.
Congress repealed the national speed limit law in 1995, and 32 states now
have limits of 70 mph or higher on some parts of their highways, according to
the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. But the ATA has yet to find a
federal lawmaker to champion its cause of reducing the national limit.
"Our proposals are practical, reasonable, and doable," ATA President and
Chief Executive Bill Graves said in a release, adding that the program continues
environmental advances made by the industry over the last 25 years. "But there's
no doubt that today's skyrocketing diesel prices give us an added incentive to
roll it out across the industry, and for Congress to provide the support the
program needs."
Diesel prices rose about a penny overnight Thursday to match the record high
of just over $4.25 a gallon set last week, according to AAA and the Oil Price
Information Service. The average price a year ago was about $2.91 a gallon.
Truck drivers, who haul 70 percent of all freight in the U.S., recently
protested rising fuel prices at the U.S. Capitol and elsewhere, and have urged
Congress to end large oil company subsidies and release fuel from the Strategic
Petroleum Reserve, among other things.
The ATA has said it now costs more than $1,000 to fill a typical
tractor-trailer, and that the nation's 3.5 million truck drivers are on pace to
spend a record $135 billion on diesel fuel this year, up $22 billion from 2007.
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