Review of the 21st Century Truck Partnership, Second Report

In July 2010, the National Research Council (NRC) appointed the Committee to Review of the 21st Century Truck Partnership, Phase 2, to conduct an independent review of the 21st Century Truck Partnership (21CTP). This Phase 2 review follows on the original NRC Phase 1 review of the Partnership conducted in 2007 and resulting in the report issued in 2008 (NRC, 2008). That 2008 review is referred to hereafter as the NRC Phase 1 report. It contains recommendations to which the 21CTP has responded (see Appendix C in this volume for the responses).

The 21CTP is a cooperative research and development (R&D) partnership including four federal agencies (the U.S. Department of Energy [DOE], the U.S.
Department of Transportation [DOT], the U.S. Department of Defense [DOD], and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency [EPA]), and 15 industrial partners (Allison Transmission, ArvinMeritor, BAE Systems, Caterpillar, Cummins Inc., Daimler Trucks North America [which includes Freightliner], Detroit Diesel Corporation [DDC], Eaton Corporation, Honeywell International, Navistar, Mack Trucks, NovaBUS, Oshkosh Truck, PACCAR, and Volvo Trucks North America).

Since the Phase 1 review, the Partnership has evolved in the face of changing budgets and new initiatives, such as the America Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA; Public Law 111-5), which injected funds during 2009 and 2010 for technology R&D on heavy-duty vehicles. The main leadership in the Partnership resides with the DOE’s Office of Vehicle Technologies, which manages a number of DOEfunded R&D programs directly related to medium- and heavy-duty vehicle (MHDV) technologies. The other 21CTP agencies associate their own existing programs that are relevant to the goals of the 21CTP under the 21CTP umbrella.

The other factor, besides changing budgets and new initiatives, that makes budgets and projects involved in the 21CTP challenging to review is that the different agencies receive their budget appropriations from different committees in Congress. Thus, there is no central, overall control over budgets and accountability. Department of Energy staff organize meetings and conference calls, maintain the information-flow infrastructure (such as websites and e-mail lists), and have led the discussions for and preparation of the updated 21CTP Roadmap and Technical White Papers (DOE, 2010a; 2011) laying out Partnership goals. The management of individual projects under the 21CTP umbrella rests with the individual federal agencies that have funded the work.

These agencies use the 21CTP information-sharing infrastructure to coordinate efforts and to ensure that valuable R&D results are communicated and that any overlap of activities among their respective efforts is reduced. The NRC’s Phase 1 review of the overall 21CTP helped communicate to the various stakeholders and to Congress the ongoing R&D efforts in the agencies and on the various projects (NRC, 2008). It is anticipated that the present, Phase 2 review and report will help extend that avenue of communication to all interested parties.

The purpose of the 21st Century Truck Partnership is to reduce fuel consumption and emissions while increasing heavy-vehicle safety by supporting research, development, and demonstration that can lead to commercially viable products and systems. The strategic approach of the Partnership includes the following:

(1) develop and implement an integrated vehicle systems R&D approach that validates and deploys advanced technology;

(2) promote research for engine, combustion, exhaust aftertreatment, fuels, and advanced materials;

(3) promote research focused on advanced heavy-duty hybrid propulsion systems;

(4) promote research to reduce parasitic losses (now called vehicle power demands);

(5) promote the development of technologies to improve truck safety;

(6) promote the development and deployment of technologies that substantially reduce energy consumption and exhaust emissions during idling; and

(7) promote the validation, demonstration, and deployment of advanced truck and bus technologies, and grow their reliability sufficient for adoption in the commercial marketplace (DOE, 2006).

The organization of The organization of this report is similar to that of the NRC Phase 1 report. The committee reviewed the major areas that the 21CTP is addressing. (See Chapter 1 for the committee’s complete statement of task). The committee’s work was aided by its review of written materials and through presentations by 21CTP government and industry partners on technical progress and accomplishments (see Appendix B). In addition, the series of white papers referred to above summarized technical information, barriers, and, in many cases, goals and milestones, for six major focus areas:

1. Engine systems―which also includes fuels, aftertreatment, and materials;

2. Hybrid propulsion systems;

3. Vehicle power demands―formerly called parasitic losses, which aims to reduce energy losses such as those from rolling resistance or aerodynamics;

4. Idle reduction―which aims to reduce the amount of energy used for truck engine idling;

5. Vehicle safety―to reduce fatalities and injuries in truck-involved crashes; and

6. Efficient operations―which is a new area and white paper with the aim of reducing fuel consumption in the U.S. truck freight-delivery system.

This Summary first presents the committee’s overall findings and recommendations from the review of the 21CTP as a whole. It then presents the major findings and recommendations, selected from Chapters 2 through 9, for the following: management strategy and priority setting for the Partnership, the first five focus areas defined by the white papers (listed above), the SuperTruck program begun in 2010, and the new, sixth focus area on efficient operations. The findings and recommendations from the chapters retain their original numbering to help the reader gain context by going to the original discussions.

The report chapters also contain findings and recommendations in addition to those in this Summary.

The new SuperTruck program is funding the development and demonstration of full vehicle systems integrating a number of technologies into Class 8 heavy-duty, longhaul trucks with the aim of reducing load-specific fuel consumption (i.e., gallons per tonmile). This new effort follows on the NRC Phase 1 report that called for integrating new technologies, including advanced diesel engines, into vehicle systems.

ISBN. 978-0-309-22247-1 Authors: Committee to Review the 21st Century Truck Partnership, Phase 2; National Research Council

Summary

Review of the 21st Century Truck Partnership, Second Report