Construction fleet managers rank carbon reduction and sustainability high on their list of challenges. Their truck fleets are facing new, stricter limits on exhaust emissions, and regulators are demanding drastic and expensive changes in the types of equipment that they buy, maintain, and operate.
Cheers and consternation are resulting from stricter exhaust emissions limits published by federal and state regulators and due to take effect starting in 2027 and tightening in 2030. Aimed primarily at further cutting nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions that form smog, the limits will increase truck acquisition costs.
Several lawsuits are challenging the regulations, and members of Congress have introduced bills to block them. The American Trucking Associations, the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association, and other groups say in their suit that meeting the new standards will be too expensive, especially for small fleets and owner-operators, running many out of business.
“The post-2030 targets remain entirely unachievable,” said Chris Spear, ATA’s CEO. “Any regulation that fails to account for the operational realities of trucking will set the industry and America’s supply chain up for failure.”
Meanwhile, truck manufacturers report that some fleets have begun “pre-buying” current vehicles to avoid the ’27 versions. This recalls pre-buys of 2007 and 2009, among others, that preceded implementation of previous EPA emissions regulations. Those resulted in frenzied production of new trucks in the months leading up to effective dates, then steep slumps accompanied by large worker layoffs. Truck builders hated those periods.
As before, the principal regulatory authorities are the federal Environmental Protection Agency and the California Air Resources Board. CARB wants to end sales of trucks with internal combustion engines by 2036 and all diesel operations by 2050. Seventeen other states plus the District of Columbia follow California’s lead in whole or part, or are considering it.
To be sure, CARB has not completely turned its back on internal combustion engines. The Carl Moyer Grants program, begun in 1998, offers money to operators of trucks and off-road machinery to modernize the power plants in their equipment. CARB said that as of 2021, it had granted more than $1.3 billion since the start of the program, resulting in reduction of 202,673 tons of NOx and 7,456 tons of particulate matter. The program, administered by local and regional air-quality districts, is still active.
What is the Clean Trucks Plan?
The latest rules from the federal EPA began taking effect in March and are part of what EPA calls its Clean Trucks Plan, announced in 2021. It is divided into three phases governing different vehicles and types of emissions. They slash the amount of greenhouse gasses, primarily carbon dioxide (CO2), emitted by diesel-powered heavy-duty vocational and on-highway trucks and buses.
Michael Regan, the agency’s administrator, said calculations show that new trucks would save operators $3.5 billion in fuel and other costs from 2027 to 2032, paying for themselves in two to four years. And the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act provides tax credits to subsidize the purchase price of new electric vehicles.
Overall, EPA’s rules will require truck manufacturers to sell more battery-electric and other zero-emission vehicles, according to analyses. These can cost two to three times more than diesel trucks, and although government subsidies can eliminate some of the incremental costs, all but the most progressive fleets have been reluctant to buy them. Battery-electric trucks in particular have come in for criticism because public charging stations are few and far between, so fleets will have to acquire and install their own chargers—a complex, expensive, and time-consuming project in every case, experts have warned.
Utilities, EVs not ready for construction applications
Moreover, critics say that electric utilities do not have the generating and distribution capacity to power the chargers, although some say they do. And in some areas, new data centers will demand huge amounts of electricity, as will microchip-manufacturing plants being built in the Midwest. In a few cases, progressive truck operators, aided by truck builders, are installing their own generating equipment, usually solar panels but sometimes wind turbines.
Heavy-duty battery-electric trucks are available from major builders for local and regional freight hauling. And there are a few medium-duty electric trucks that could be used in construction. But except for trash collection, there are no heavy-duty electric vocational trucks on the market, and they won’t appear until late in this decade or into the 2030s, predicts the North American Council for Freight Efficiency, an independent equipment evaluation organization.
That might or might not be in time to meet one of the EPA’s recent mandates: Starting in 2027, an increasing percentage of new vocational trucks must be zero-emission products, though the initial number is reduced from previous proposals. By 2032, 30% of vocational trucks must be zero emitters. These would have to be electric trucks, with power coming from storage batteries or fuel cells, the latter running on hydrogen. It will also be permissible to use internal combustion engines fueled by hydrogen, now generated from water by electrolysis and steam-formulated from natural gas.
The more zero-emission trucks produced, however, the fewer diesel-powered trucks that would be available, industry sources complain. And diesels will be needed to carry the transportation industry into the 2030s. Engine builders have spent hundreds of millions of dollars developing diesel products that meet the 2027 limits, plus electric powertrains to meet regulatory demands of the 2030s. So they support the new rules.
Current-model diesels are so clean that their exhaust emissions can barely be measured, according to the Engine Technology Forum, which advocates for their continued use. “As a result of progressively more stringent emissions standards over the last three decades, engines have undergone a transformation that enables them to achieve near-zero levels of emissions today,” the group states. “Internal combustion engines now meet the most stringent U.S. EPA emissions standards that require emissions of particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, and hydrocarbons to be near-zero levels.
“Starting in 2027, nitrogen oxide emissions from commercial trucks will have to be 82.5% lower than the current generation of vehicles (from 0.20 to 0.035 gram per brake horsepower-hour),” the forum’s statement continues. “In addition, new requirements increase the useful life for emissions compliance from 435,000 miles to 650,000 miles and boost warranty coverage from 100,000 miles to 435,000 miles.”
In the longer term, regulators want to do away entirely with the burning of fossil fuels, jumping to zero-emission vehicles. Yet fossil fuel use can be reduced by substituting biofuels—which blend oils from plants and animals with petroleum—or using straight bio fuels in internal combustion engines.
