The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee approved 21-0 a substitute amendment to its surface transportation bill S. 2302, “America’s Transportation Infrastructure Act of 2019,” marking the first step in reauthorizing the surface transportation law set to expire in 2020.
07-30-2019 NATSO and trade groups representing businesses that provide the majority of motor fuel retail sales in the United States urged the state of Maryland to reject a proposal from the state’s utility companies to spend more than $100 million on a statewide network of electric charging stations and instead work with the fuel retail industry to deploy electric charging infrastructure via the existing privately developed motor fuels infrastructure.
04-16-2018 The House Subcommittee on Highways and Transit capped off a series of Congressional hearings on infrastructure March 7, this time exploring long-term funding options for infrastructure.
03-08-2018 Advances in Class 8 autonomous and electric truck technologies continue to make headlines, but executives from two major trucking companies said they don’t expect the new technology to bring major changes to the long-haul trucking industry any time soon. However, hours-of-service and electronic logging device mandates are bringing changes that have made the speed of service at truckstops and travel plazas even more important.
02-11-2018 The House Ways and Means Committee on Nov. 2 released the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act to overhaul major aspects of the U.S. Tax system. The bill will be the subject of Committee consideration next week, kicking off formal tax committee action on the first such overhaul of the U.S. tax system in more than 30 years. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-UT) announced that he plans to release a Senate Republican version of a tax reform bill after the Ways and Means Committee completes its work, as soon as November 9. The Senate Finance Committee could consider its own plan at the same time the full House votes on its plan in an effort to make as much progress as possible on the legislation prior to Thanksgiving.
11-03-2017 Several state legislatures are expected to take up the issue of whether to impose special fees on hybrid and electric vehicles in 2015 as a means of generating revenue for highway construction and maintenance, Bloomberg BNA reported.
11-24-2014 The Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) should work with existing interstate exit-based businesses to install electric car-charging stations rather than compete with the private sector by utilizing taxpayer dollars to establish them at rest areas, NATSO told the agency this week.
07-24-2013 With Congress increasingly critical of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), legislation introduced last week is taking a different tack: it would require that 30 percent of new automobiles in 2016 operate on non-petroleum fuels instead of, or in addition to, petroleum-based fuels. That figure would increase to 50 percent in 2017 and in subsequent years.
07-01-2013 While alternative fuels and technologies may increase in the future, diesel will remain the primary fuel for the trucking industry for decades. The findings were part of a two-year study on the future of alternative fuels conducted by the National Petroleum Council. The U.S. Secretary of Energy requested the study, which looked at the full breadth of alternative-fuel options alongside traditional diesel and gasoline.
06-20-2013 Lawmakers tasked with finding new revenue streams to fund infrastructure projects increasingly are asking drivers of electric and hybrid vehicles to pay their fair share of infrastructure fees.
06-17-2013 Automakers tasked with meeting new federal fuel-efficiency standards of 54.5 miles a gallon by 2025 plan to trim fuel consumption by reducing automobile weights as well focusing on electric vehicles.
03-11-2013