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DEFAZIO HIGHLIGHTS NEED FOR CLEAN ENERGY DURING
TEST-DRIVE OF VOLVO ELECTRIC TRUCK
In early May, Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR-4),
Chair of the House Committee on Transportation
and Infrastructure, visited Volvo Trucks
North America’s TEC Equipment dealership
location in Coburg, Oregon, to test-drive an
electric Volvo Class 8 truck and highlight his
clean energy priorities.
“For years, climate change deniers have
argued that big businesses would never
choose to invest in clean technologies
because it wouldn’t make business sense
— but now, big corporations are showing
that there is a business case for climate
solutions,” said DeFazio. “As I work with
President Biden to move the American
Jobs Plan through Congress, I look forward
to making investments that move
our country toward cleaner, greener technologies
and a zero-pollution transportation
sector. It’s a plan that addresses the
existential threat of climate change and
creates thousands of good-paying jobs
and strengthens an economy reeling from
the COVID-19 pandemic.”
During the visit, DeFazio was joined by
TEC Equipment’s Founder and CEO Dave
Thompson; Oregon Department of Energy’s
Assistant Director for Planning and Innovation
Alan Zelenka; Forth Mobility’s Executive
Director Jeff Allen; and Volvo Group
North America’s Senior Vice President of
Public Affairs Jonathan Miller
“At Volvo Group North America, we are
committed to electrification and many other
efforts to support the decarbonization
Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR-4), chair of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, visited Volvo
Trucks North America’s TEC Equipment dealership in Coburg, Oregon, to discuss clean energy priorities and test
drive a Volvo VNR Electric Class 8 truck.
of transportation and sustainability of our
environment, including the launch of the
Volvo VNR Electric Class 8 truck model,
as demonstrated in Coburg, Oregon,” said
Miller. “Last year, the Volvo Group announced
plans in line with the Paris Agreement
to be fossil-fuel free by 2040. While
these are ambitious goals, we are currently
taking orders and delivering on our plans
to commercially launch battery-electric
trucks, buses and construction equipment
in the United States and Canada.”
The Volvo VNR Electric truck is designed
for driving cycles with both local and regional
SEE ELECTRIC TRUCK, PAGE 20
50 YEARS, FROM PAGE 16
the past 20 years, and the program has continued
to ensure these bridges are safe for
those who rely on the structures for travel
and commerce.
Less than one month after the celebration,
an Arkansas Department of Transportation
inspection found a fractured beam in the Mississippi
River bridge between Arkansas and
Tennessee, shutting down the bridge for an
undetermined amount of time.
The NBIS requires regular and thorough
inspections of highway bridges by trained inspectors
to detect potential structural problems
early and to ensure maintenance efforts
are being performed. State departments of
transportation inspect bridges, on average,
once every 24 months and report the results
to FHWA. If a bridge is rated as potentially
unsafe, immediate actions are taken, which
could include closure, prompt repairs, or
load posting to restrict use by heavy vehicles.
In addition to specialized training for
bridge inspectors, the program also requires
the collection of bridge condition data for inclusion
in FHWA’s National Bridge Inventory
(NBI), which helps transportation officials
make informed decisions about funding priorities.
“The NBIS is vital to bridge safety in our
nation,” added Pollack. “The (Biden) administration’s
American Jobs Plan proposes significant
investment in our nation’s bridges to
continue improve their condition and make
them even safer.”
FHWA officially adopted the NBIS regulations
in 1971 after the collapse of the Silver
Bridge in West Virginia. The bridge collapsed
into the Ohio River in 1967 because of a
crack in the bridge’s suspension chain. The
tragedy, which took the lives of 46 people,
brought national attention to the issue of safe
bridge conditions and led to a systematic effort
to ensure oversight at the national level.
Since the program’s inception, FHWA
has worked to update training requirements
for bridge inspectors and replace
narrative bridge inspection summaries
with specific assessment criteria to improve
consistency.
According to a statement from the FHWA,
President Joe Biden’s American Jobs Plan
would provide an additional $115 billion to
modernize the bridges, highways, roads, and
main streets that are in most critical need of
repair. It would also fix 10 significant bridges
in need of reconstruction and repair the
worst 10,000 smaller bridges to reconnect
communities across the country.
18 TRUCKLOAD AUTHORITY | WWW.TRUCKLOAD.ORG TCA JULY/AUGUST 2021