July 15, 2008

YRC’s Bill Zollars Talks Up Green Fleets

Bill Zollars, head of transportation company YRC Worldwide, says calls to return to a 55 mph national truck speed limit are off base because today’s trucks are most fuel efficient between 63 and 65 mph, FleetOwner reports.

According to Zollars, a failed attempt by YRC to push for a national truck speed limit of 65 mph five years ago, could have saved the industry as much as 1.5 billion gallons of diesel fuel. A $6 billion saving, at the current price of $4 a gallon.

Zollars also says railroad commercials touting the fuel efficiency and reductions in CO2 are problematic. While ads claim to take some 300 freight trailers off the road with the haul service of one train, Zollars says the railway system doesn’t reach many places and are usually delayed, which is why 70 percent of U.S. freight is moved by truck.

Some 35 million miles out of the 1.8 billion miles YRC’s trucks log every year, are by trucks hauling triple trailers. According to Zollars, using triples saved some 16 million gallons of fuel and eliminated 117,000 tons of carbon emissions -a 30 percent improvement in the company’s productivity.

Zollars also resists a cap and trade solution to CO2 emissions because he says managing it for millions of commercial trucks is harder than managing carbon emissions from some 3,000 stationary sources of carbon emission.

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