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Environmental shifts in the marketplace could affect you in the next decade. Two critical challenges are sustainability and the reduction of harmful emissions.

The cusp of a new decade is a good time to survey the trucking landscape. Two critical challenges on the horizon are sustainability and the reduction of harmful emissions. All of us, including business leaders, can play a key role in effecting significant change.

Still, according to a recent study that asked CEOs about sustainability strategies, respondents said that investing in long-term strategic objectives can succumb to pressure from extreme cost-consciousness. The study, called “The Decade to Deliver: A Call to Business Action,” reports that only about half of CEOs who responded are deploying low-carbon and renewable energy and are decarbonizing their supply chains. Only half see a net-zero future for their company by 2030.

Tracking the shifts

Two forces that could move corporate America toward solving environmental problems are competition and changing policies.

In terms of competition, some companies are using sustainability as a key advantage; finding that it improves efficiency, innovation and growth. A fleet that adopts alternative fuel vehicles, for example, can cut costs, improve safety and save on maintenance labor (in that respect, maybe the survey should have also asked for responses from CFOs and COOs). The move is good for the bottom line and provides the added bonus of significantly decreasing greenhouse gas emissions. The switch to electric, propane autogas or compressed natural gas (CNG) would give that fleet a competitive advantage.

Policy changes need to be watched closely, too. About a dozen countries and 20 cities around the world have proposed banning the future sale of passenger vehicles powered by fossil fuels such as gasoline and diesel. Can you foresee how this kind of shift in the marketplace might affect you in the next decade? Since the average vehicle ranges from five to seven years in service (in some cases much longer), it's a reasonable and realistic consideration for the profile of your operation.

Partnering for sustainability

Once you consider the benefits you can reap from a sustainability plan, your next move is to create your own. It can include a range of goals, from recycling to carpooling to energy-efficient office spaces. For truck owners, vehicles obviously must be part of the equation as well.

You can weigh vehicle options by researching available models, prices, safety information and fueling infrastructure requirements. Ask other owner-ops who have made the switch for their feedback. Compare total cost of ownership using an online calculator, like the one found on the Roush Clean Tech site.

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Michigan police say that a truck driver suffered only minor injuries in a violent collision with a bridge on Thursday afternoon.

The crash was reported around 1:40 p.m. on Fenton, Michigan.

A semi truck hauling pickles was traveling southbound on U.S. 23 when it left the roadway and drove up an embankment, then crashed into the Owen Road Bridge.

The truck caught fire after it hit the bridge.

The truck driver suffered only minor injuries in the crash.

Michigan State Police say that the truck driver lost control due to a steering wheel malfunction, NBC 25 reports.

Cleanup took hours, but all lanes of U.S. 23 have reopened.

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TORONTO, Ont. – Ryder System is shutting down six of its 44 Canadian maintenance and service locations in the new year.

“The closures are scheduled for next year, however we are announcing the plans now so that we can provide the best possible service for our customers,” Ryder confirmed in a statement to Trucknews.com. “Ryder will continue to manage the service process through Ryder FleetCare, a network of more than 1,000 qualified maintenance providers, to ensure our customers’ vehicles are well-maintained no matter where they are.”

The following locations are being closed by the end of February: Port Kells, B.C.; Edmonton, Alta.; Calgary North, Alta.; Saskatoon, Sask.; Sudbury, Ont.; and Surrey, B.C.

“Like all businesses in a competitive market, we must always look at new ways to manage our costs and efficiently deploy our capital,” Ryder said. “As a normal course of business Ryder continually reviews all aspects of its operations, properties, facilities, and processes to identify underperforming pieces of our business. As such, Ryder has decided to close six underperforming locations out of its 44 fleet maintenance and service locations across Canada. While making decisions that impact our employees, their families, and our customers is never easy, it is a necessary step to continue to remain competitive in the markets we serve.”

Sixty-seven jobs will be eliminated, but Ryder said it is working with impacted employees to help them find other employment opportunities within Ryder. Ryder has nearly 2,000 employees in Canada. Positions being eliminated include technicians, clerks, sales reps, supervisors and managers.

“These actions will have little to minimal customer impact,” Ryder said.

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan poses with a prototype of a domestically produced electric car in Gebze, Turkey, on Dec. 27, 2019.

ANKARA, Turkey — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Dec. 27 unveiled prototypes of a domestically produced electric car, putting him closer to fulfilling a long-held dream of building Turkey’s first “national” automobile.

Erdogan showcased the SUV and sedan models of the car, known for now as TOGG after a consortium of Turkish companies that will produce them, at a ceremony in Gebze, in Turkey’s northwestern industrial heartland.

The president was scheduled to test drive a car across a suspension bridge over the Gulf of Izmit. He offered to put his name down on a possible list for advance orders. The Turkish vehicles are expected to hit the market in 2022.

“We are witnessing a historic day, realizing a 60-year dream,” Erdogan said. “I know that our people is impatiently waiting for the day they can own this car.”

The Turkish leader has long pushed industrialists to build a domestic automobile as part of his vision for making Turkey an economic powerhouse.

The vehicle is being produced by a consortium of five Turkish companies called the Automobile Initiative Group of Turkey, or TOGG, in cooperation with the Turkish Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges.

Turkish media reports said the car was designed by Italy’s Pininfarina design company, which has created models for Ferrari and California-based electric car maker Karma.

Erdogan said the cars would be produced in a factory to be built on former military-owned land in the province of Bursa. The factory, scheduled to be completed in 2021, is expected to employ 4,300 people.

TOGG chief executive Gurcan Karakas said Turkey hopes to produce five different models of the car within 15 years.

The TOGG is Turkey’s second effort to produce a Turkish-made automobile. During the 1960s, a group of Turkish engineers built prototypes of a car called Devrim, or Revolution in English. The project was later abandoned.

Several foreign brands, including Ford and Toyota, are assembled in Turkey.

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Equipping truckers to navigate harsh winter conditions

Though the holiday season rings in a festive spirit and cheer to most Americans, it is work as usual for a section of commercial drivers who haul freight through those weeks. This is a time of year when drivers contend with the frustration of being separated from their families and brave inclement climatic conditions that make driving difficult, and even perilous.

Rain, snow, hail, ice or fog enhance risks to roadway mobility and safety and can significantly increase travel times, create congestion and decrease highway capacity — distressing possibilities for drivers who get paid by the hour.

“When truckers drive over the course of several hours, they can go through a variety of different weather conditions. For example, when temperatures drop or if there’s heavy rain, the propensity to hydroplane or lose some control of the vehicle increases,” said Jason Palmer, the COO of SmartDrive, a transport intelligence platform helping increase fleet performance. “It’s important for drivers to know when they are getting into such situations and start slowing the vehicle down during instances where their visibility or control is affected.”

Palmer explained that in his work, he regularly encounters truckers who go roughly 5 mph over the speed limit — which isn’t considered unusual. But set against dangerous driving conditions like low visibility and slippery surfaces, excess speeding can cause drivers to lose control of their vehicles, leading to disastrous consequences.

“Another key focus is to think of cruise control. Fleets need to have tighter control over the operation of the vehicle, and from the best practices standpoint, it is safer to disengage cruise control so that they can more readily manage the operation of the vehicle,” Palmer said.

Fleet management can incrementally improve driver behavior by repurposing recorded incidents from previous years as coaching tools. “Using videos of collisions or near collisions and explaining how to avoid them can help. The goal is not to show or say who the driver is, but to focus on educating drivers to be more aware of the consequences or impact of such different kinds of situations,” Palmer said.

Video tutorials can help cement best practices and help drivers pay more attention to how fast they drive and the changing conditions around the vehicle. Identifying changing conditions is vital, especially during winter, when weather conditions can tend to deteriorate more rapidly.

Apart from training drivers, carriers must also have policies that define how their fleets operate during inclement weather. For instance, vehicles that haul freight during winter must be equipped with all-season tires, snow chains, jumper cables, and tactical flashlights. Trucks should also be modernized with advanced braking and advanced traction control systems, which helps vehicles operate better in harsh winters.

Additionally, companies can leverage data to improve driver safety. “Fleets are starting to bring in weather data and messaging drivers to ensure they understand the weather they may be driving into and also the changing conditions they need to anticipate,” Palmer said. “We are starting to see more real-time information being fed to drivers, and this is a trend that will really help drivers make better decisions.”

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Authorities say that the company "charged customers at least hundreds of millions of dollars in hidden fees after making false promises about helping customers save on fuel costs."

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced that it has filed suit against a fuel card company for alleged deceptive practices and hidden fees that they say cost truckers millions of dollars.

On Friday, December 20, the FTC announced that it had filed a lawsuit against Georgia-based FleetCor in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.

FleetCor markets fuel card services under the  “Fuelman” brand name in addition to co-branded cards.

The FTC said that FleetCor “charged customers at least hundreds of millions of dollars in hidden fees after making false promises about helping customers save on fuel costs.”

The suit accuses FleetCor of falsely promising truckers that they’d save money by using their fuel cards, with no fees or up-front set up costs or membership fees.

The FTC outlined the various means of alleged deception in a news release:

According to the complaint, the defendants often have waited to begin charging many fees until a few billing cycles have passed, making the fees harder to detect among a customer’s monthly bill fluctuations. The complaint also alleges that FleetCor’s invoices often have failed to disclose that any fees were being charged, requiring customers to proactively view other account management reports. Even on those documents, many fees have been obscured among other information.

The FTC alleges that the defendants also have not posted customer payments when they were received. That has led to even more fees, including late fees for on-time payments and “high credit risk” fees, because the customers ostensibly had paid late. The defendants have charged some customers “high risk” fees for being in the trucking and transportation industry, even though FleetCor’s primary customer base operates in those very industries.

In addition, the defendants’ promises about stopping unauthorized charges also have proved untrue, according to the complaint. While the defendants have advertised FleetCor’s cards as “fuel only” cards, cardholders have been able to purchase any item sold at fueling locations, including beer and snacks.

The complaint alleges that FleetCor’s own terms of service have said customers would have to pay charges even if they were outside the limits placed by the customer. Internal company emails called the practice “…the most egregious customer impact we do as it takes customers by surprise (unless they’re really large) based on their experience with consumer cards.”

The complaint alleges that customers generally have not achieved the advertised per-gallon savings by using FleetCor’s cards. To support this allegation, the complaint cites FleetCor’s own documents, which show that customers’ average savings on fuel have fallen far short of the defendants’ marketing promises. The complaint also alleges that an analysis requested by Clarke in response to negative press coverage about these marketing practices showed that, on average, customers have saved a fraction of a cent per gallon—far less than the 5-10 cents per gallon frequently touted by the defendants.  In addition, the fees charged by the defendants have exceeded any savings otherwise obtained using FleetCor’s cards.

The lawsuit accused FleetCor of violating the FTC Act’s prohibitions on unfair and deceptive acts and practices.

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