Standards Body Passes on ‘Hot’ Fuel Rule
This story appears in the July 27 print edition of Transport Topics. Click here to subscribe today.
Trucking groups hailed the decision by the National Conference on Weights and Measures not to proceed with proposals to regulate the temperature of retail fuel at the pump.
“We’re pleased,” said Rich Moskowitz, regulatory counsel for American Trucking Associations. “They recognize that the impact upon the consumer of requiring automatic temperature compensation may not be beneficial because the costs of ATC will be passed on to the consumer.”
The national standard-setting group was slated to take up two resolutions at its annual meeting July 12-16 in San Antonio, but the committee charged with examining temperature compensation recommended the item be stricken.
“The overwhelming majority of comments were opposing ATC,” the committee said in a statement about a proposal to require temperature compensation.
The committee pulled the item, citing “conference consensus against ATC, economic cost factors, lack of benefit to consumers, absence of uniformity in the marketplace and the additional cost to weights and measures officials and service companies.”
The second resolution was to allow retailers to regulate for temperature — a proposal Moskowitz said would have been disastrous.
“The most important thing is that ATC not be implemented on a permissive basis because that would allow fuel retailers to game the system” by using temperature compensation equipment only in those circumstances where it would benefit the retailer.
Natso President Lisa Mullings said the group “voted to keep fairness and transparency in fuel pricing and delivery.”
“The current system yields the most benefits for consumers, who ultimately would have paid the price for changing requirements,” she said.
Natso was formerly the National Association of Truck Stop Operators.
In its statement, the committee said there were “very few proponents” of ATC under the voluntary proposal.
The issue of temperature compensation rose to prominence following a 2006 Kansas City Star article.
Supporters of ATC regulations argue that as liquid fuel is warmed, it expands, but the energy content of the fuel remains constant. Historically, fuel sold from wholesalers to retailers is adjusted for these changes in temperature, but fuel sold to consumers is not.
The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association is one of several groups that have pressed for regulation of fuel temperatures.
Norita Taylor, spokeswoman for the drivers group, said the decision by the National Conference on Weights and Measures was “an example of highly effective lobbying by petroleum marketers and their effect on regulatory issues to the detriment of consumers.”
