Although the Clinton administration’s proposed tougher standard for tailpipe pollution from diesel trucks and buses long has been anticipated, diesel engine manufacturers on Wednesday said they were in a race to produce engines that would meet the cleaner burning standards.
Under the rules unveiled Wednesday by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, oil refiners are going to be required to produce virtually sulfur-free diesel fuel while engine manufacturers are going to be required to reduce pollutants by more than 95 percent.
Some in the oil industry criticized the EPA standard as overly burdensome, and truckers worry that altering engines to burn low-sulfur fuel will make trucks much more expensive.
But the Diesel Technology Forum, a Herndon, Va.-based industry group representing diesel engine and vehicle manufacturers and petroleum refiners, praised the EPA for spreading around responsibility for the pollution problem.
“It’s the first time the EPA has looked at this problem in a systematic way, recognizing that engines and fuel are both parts of an integrated diesel power system,” said the group’s spokesman, David Bartlett.
Bartlett said, however, that the group was chagrined that off-road equipment, such as construction equipment and road graders, would not be subject to the stringent new standards.
The requirement for diesel engine manufacturers would kick in for model year 2007, but the firms would have four years, up to 2010, to be fully compliant with the new standard.
Diesel engine manufacturers said they are not ready to produce all their diesel engines to this standard, but some predicted they would be able to reduce the amount of soot and smog-causing nitrogen oxide by the deadline.
“We are working our way to the 2007 goal,” said Marsha Hausser, a spokeswoman for Peoria, Ill.-based Caterpillar Inc. “The majority of our R&D research funds go to improving emissions and developing cleaner burning engines.”
Lisa Shalett, senior research analyst with Sanford C. Bernstein in New York, said: “No one has definitely gotten there. They are all scrambling to meet the deadline.”
For Chicago-based Navistar International Corp., Shalett said, the new EPA rules probably would require aggressive investment in new technologies.
“That reduces cash flow and is not a good thing in the short term,” Shalett said. “But in the long term it’s a huge competitive advantage” for Navistar, which has a vehicle that runs on low-sulfur fuel in the works.
Navistar, through its International Truck and Engine Corp., introduced in Los Angeles this week a new trademarked Green Diesel Technology school bus.
The bus, which has a filter to winnow out “particulate” pollution, is fueled with the ultra-low-sulfur fuel, under 15 parts per million sulfur content, that the EPA will be requiring.
By comparison, today’s standard is 500 parts per million.
The proposed rules, which are subject to a six-month comment period and may yet be revised, would change the way engine manufacturers do business.
“In order for us to even come close to meeting those stringent levels, it will require manufacturers to add after-treatment in the exhaust system,” said Christine Vujovich, vice president of environmental policy and planning for Columbus, Ind.-based Cummins Engine Co.
“For the first time, heavy duty engine manufacturers will be contracting with after-treatment suppliers,” Vujovich said.
