CARB Plans to Amend Greenhouse Gas Rules

This story appears in the Nov. 1 print edition of Transport Topics.

California environmental regulators were expected late last week to make public their final slate of proposed amendments designed to help motor carriers ease the financial pain of complying with the state’s tough heavy-duty truck greenhouse gas emissions reduction and retrofitting regulations.

Citing the potential negative effects of the freight recession, members of the California Air Resources Board in April asked the agency’s staff to develop changes to the regulations that would cut the recession’s sting for motor carriers but still would reduce diesel emissions to help the state meet its 2014 federal clean air deadline.

The changes to the regulations are complex, based on truck types and model years, fleet size and other factors. In general, the amendments will extend compliance deadlines by up to a year, spread soot filter retrofit and clean engine compliance schedules, grant exemptions from some regulatory requirements to certain carriers and allow fleets to use averages to meet deadlines in some cases.

“There definitely are provisions that will make it easier to report and will offer a little more flexibility,” said Mike Tunnell, director of environmental affairs for American Trucking Associations. “On the bus and truck regulation, there are delays in the start dates and for compliance and some scaling back of the requirements.”

CARB members are scheduled to formally consider the proposed amended regulations on Dec. 16 and 17 after a 45-day public comment period expected to begin on Oct. 29, said CARB spokeswoman Karen Caesar.

The amendments will add flexibility and delay some compliance deadlines, not only for the reefer rule but also the heavy-duty truck greenhouse gas regulation, the truck and bus regulation and the drayage rule.

A CARB staff report earlier this year concluded that soft freight volumes in the past two years have reduced pollution levels throughout the state, far below earlier projections. For that reason, the board concluded that compliance delays would not adversely affect public health.

The board is expected to consider proposed amendments to the state’s transport refrigeration unit retrofit regulation at a public hearing on Nov. 18.

“The TRU regulation amendments are just a Band-Aid,” Tunnell told Transport Topics. “However, CARB is going to look at more substantial changes in the middle of next year. This is just the near-term fix.”

On the other hand, the CARB amendments to the greenhouse gas and the truck and bus regulations are addressing many of the trucking industry’s concerns, Tunnell said.

“But as we continue to talk to CARB about the regulations, we find more and more things that either aren’t quite doable or need some changing,” Tunnell said. “I’m not sure that this is the end of changes for either of those regulations.”

But even with revisions the rules will remain the most stringent state emissions reduction requirements in the United States. There have been widespread complaints by motor carriers that they’re going to be very costly.

Draft amendments have revised the compliance schedules to require particulate matter filters from 2012 to 2014 on 1998 to 2006 model year engines, and replacement for 20 year or older engines from 2015 to 2020. In addition, all trucks must have 2010-compliant engines by 2023, according to a CARB summary of some of the changes.

Fleets with one to three larger trucks have an option to phase-in DPFs from 2014 to 2016 and must report from 2012 to 2016 to take advantage of the option, CARB said.

In general, the greenhouse gas regulation requires phased-in deployment of SmartWay-certified technologies for 53-foot or larger trailers that will improve fuel efficiency by 5% for dry vans and 4% for refrigerated vans, Tunnell told a group of trucking executives at ATA’s Management Conference & Exhibition in October.

“It basically comes down to a trailer side-skirt or a trailer fairing that will get 5% or 4% improvement,” Tunnell said.

However, Matthew Schrap, director of environmental affairs for the California Trucking Association, said not all motor carriers will achieve the 5% improvement rate in fuel efficiency, partly because the improvements are based on average speeds on a controlled track of 62 miles per hour. The state’s speed limit for heavy tractor-trailer combinations is only 55 miles per hour, Schrap said.

Tunnell said another issue with the greenhouse gas regulation is the requirement for SmartWay-certified tires on tractors by January 2012.

“What about retreads?” Tunnell asked. “There isn’t a SmartWay approved retread and there isn’t a process.”

Tire manufacturers hope to have a process in effect by the end of 2011, Tunnel said. “So to be in step with the 2012 requirement, it would really be cutting it close,” he added.

As a result, Tunnell said he believes CARB will delay that requirement until 2013 for some motor carriers.