By TIM ALEXANDER
Illinois Correspondent

BOULDER, Colo. — The U.S. trucking industry is under pressure to increase energy efficiency as rail providers, newly lauded for their green credentials, look to increase their freight haulage, according to recent news reports from Reuters and other sources.

To help meet that demand, the Colorado-based Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) hosted the inaugural meeting of its North American Council for Freight Efficiency (NACFE) Nov. 3 in Chicago, with the goal of reinventing the trucking industry to carry just as much freight on half as much energy.

Energy experts say trucks use at least three times as much energy as trains, per tons carried. “There is a lack of trustworthy information evaluating different technologies for fleets to make investment decisions,” stated Hiroko Kawai, NACFE leader. “The freight industry, and the trucking industry in particular, have been burned by a snake-oil salesman approach to technology.”

NACFE will collect, assess and circulate information on performance and efficiency benefits to technology developers, fleet owners and truck drivers, RMI officials indicated. RMI’s vision is to secure a world that is thriving, verdant and secure, for all, forever, according to company literature. One of its missions is to “drive the transition from coal and oil to efficiency and renewables.”

NACFE describes its goals to develop a profitable, safe and efficient trucking industry as follows:

•Define freight efficiency metrics in a way that is consistent with industry customers

•Build and maintain an easy to access clearinghouse of information

•Rate technologies or methods based on certified testing and results

•Develop new methods and gather new information as needed

•Evaluate and advise users on improvements about configurations and maintenance based on industry best practices

•Educate drivers and fleets about conditions that affect efficiency

•Predict efficiency gains for specific technology combinations

Speakers at NACFE’s inaugural meeting included Patrick Davis, the U.S. Department of Energy’s program manager of vehicle technologies, and Dimitri Kazarinoff, vice president and general manager of hybrid power systems at Eaton Corp.

Trucks transport approximately 70 percent, or 10 billion tons, of all U.S. freight annually, according to the American Trucking Assoc., though the recession cut the amount of freight delivered in the past year by 10 percent. The Center for Transportation Analysis at Oak Ridge National Laboratory determined in 2007 that the 2.2 million registered trucks in the United States averaged 5.1 miles per gallon.

As the trucking industry faces pressure to increase its fuel efficiency, Congress is considering bills that would extend a 25 percent tax credit to all new freight rail expansion, Reuters reported.