This Editorial appears in the June 25 print edition of Transport Topics. Click here to subscribe today. As noted on other pages of this week’s edition of Transport Topics, American Trucking Associations will be conducting the first comprehensive summit on the use of natural gas in trucking.
The national conference will be held in the Washington, D.C., area, Nov. 28-30. While ATA members will have first call on the limited seats for the summit, registration will eventually be opened to everyone.
As ATA President Bill Graves explained when he announced the event: “While there has been a great deal of good work done on the subject of natural gas and trucking, I feel no one has truly put the whole picture — from suppliers and manufacturers to distributors and users — together, and we intend to do that.”
The association is currently at work firming up the agenda for the event and expects to release a preliminary program in the next few weeks.
Sessions will range from producers of natural gas products and manufacturers of engines that can burn them, to fleet experts who are already running early models and government regulators.
The summit will begin with a welcoming reception on Nov. 28 and will follow with two days of speakers and panels.
Registration begins on July 2 for ATA members and for all others four weeks later. The event will be held at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Arlington, Va., very close to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.
ATA announced plans for the summit as natural gas continues to attract a great deal of interest from the nation’s truck fleets and the companies that produce the trucks and engines that the carriers use.
Much of the interest in natural gas has been spurred by the price differential between NG and diesel. Natural gas prices continue at near-record lows in the United States, as production expands in large part because of the wave of hydraulic fracturing that has permitted producers to pump natural gas from previously unusable deposits.
The ATA summit will bring together all elements of the fuel and trucking industries for an in-depth look at what the future holds for the use of natural gas in over-the-road trucking.
More information on the summit can be obtained by e-mailing natgas@trucking.org or by calling (703) 838-1935.
See you at the ATA Summit on Natural Gas in Trucking in November.
