Government

Consumer prices fell in August for the first time in almost two years, the Labor Department said Tuesday.

Oil prices continued to fall Tuesday, dropping below $92 a barrel in early trading, while Department of Energy approved oil releases from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to help refineries left with supply shortages due to Hurricane Ike, Bloomberg reported.

PeopleNet, which provides onboard communications and fleet management systems, said Monday it is integrating its eDriver Logs automated driver log application with LoadMaster dispatch and enterprise software from McLeod Software.

In a sweeping decision with possible national implications, the Environmental Protection Agency has granted California a waiver that will allow state environmental regulators to implement stringent new heavy-duty vehicle and engine onboard diagnostics requirements for 2010 engines and beyond.

The European Parliament’s energy committee voted to require that at least 10% of road transport fuel in 2020 come from renewable sources led by biofuels, while adding checks to prevent food shortages, Bloomberg reported.

Manufacturing growth in New York state declined this month, showing contraction, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York said Monday.

A coalition of highway users including American Trucking Associations applauded the U.S. Department of Transportation’s decision last week to reject tolls on Interstate 80 in Pennsylvania, though a truckers group in that state warned that officials may seek to privatize the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

A federal judge last week denied American Trucking Associations’ request for a preliminary injunction against controversial portions of emission-reduction programs at the California ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.

Congress, after an abrupt about-face by the Bush administration, moved quickly last week to transfer more than $8 billion into the Highway Trust Fund to keep the road-building finance program solvent.