Business

The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration said a new federal rule will expand the enforcement authority of federal regulators to conduct “enhanced inspections” and investigations of packaged hazardous materials.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration and the Transportation Security Administration have conducted several dozen overlapping fleet inspections, according to a recent Government Accountability Office report about wasteful and duplicative federal programs.

Executives of IdleAir, a truck stop idle-reduction equipment operator, defended their service after sharp criticism from the company’s former largest landlord.

Truck and engine maker Navistar Inc. said it has won regulatory approval for its 15-liter power plant, which it will unveil later this month at the Mid-America Trucking Show, and that it has submitted documents to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and California Air Resources Board for a 13-liter engine that meets nitrogen oxide limits without the use of emission credits.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration will require all Mexican trucks entering the United States to be equipped with electronic onboard recorders — and will pay for them — an agency spokeswoman said last week.

Trade organizations representing motor carriers, shippers, and retailers continued their campaign against the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s proposed hours-of-service rule change, making last-minute appeals last week that the agency withdraw the rule and claiming it would hurt supply chain productivity and highway safety.

Thousands of motor carriers have received erroneous warnings from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration recently about the possible loss of their operating authority due to the cancellation of cargo insurance policies that the agency no longer requires in most cases.

Rand McNally introduced a series of upgrades to its TruckPC device Monday including navigation improvements, two-way communication and truck monitoring, it said.

U.S. retail diesel prices shot up another 15.5 cents last week in the largest one-week increase in nearly three years, as the national average price reached $3.871 a gallon, the highest since October 2008, the Department of Energy said.