Trucking industry opposes cap-and-trade program
by June 10, 2009 1:52 pm 69 views
The American Trucking Associations is opposing the Obama Administration’s proposed cap-and-trade program saying it would impose significant costs on the trucking industry and consumers.
Danny Loe, director of marketing and public relations for Fort Smith-based ABF Freight System, said the trucking company supports the ATA position. Lane Kidd, president of the Arkansas Trucking Association, said the state trucking group does not yet have a position on the issue.
Speaking on Wednesday (June 10) to a Congressional committee, ATA first vice chairman Tommy Hodges said the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (H.R. 2454) “threatens to significantly increase fuel costs and jeopardizes the economic viability of trucking companies,” according to an ATA statement.
“Fleets are extremely sensitive to rapidly shifting operating costs given thin operating margins,” Hodges noted in the statement. “These margins continue to be chipped away, given the numerous and unprecedented costs being imposed upon the industry to reduce emissions from trucks.”
Hodges explained that provisions in H.R. 2454’s cap-and-trade program grant oil refiners 2 percent of the carbon allowances between 2014 and 2016 to help mitigate refinery Greenhouse Gas emissions.
The trucking industry believes that mobile sources, such as commercial trucks, should be addressed differently than traditional stationary sources under any proposed carbon reduction regulatory program.
Hodges also serves as Chairman of ATA’s Sustainability Task Force, which developed a sustainability agenda that will reduce fuel consumption by 86 billion gallons and CO2 emissions by 900 million tons for all vehicles over the next 10 years.
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