E&MU: Ultra-Low-Sulfur Diesel Silences Its Opponents

By Frederick Kiel, Staff Reporter

This story appears in the July/August 2010 issue of Equipment & Maintenance Update, a supplement to the July 6 print edition of Transport Topics. Click here to subscribe today.

Ultra-low-sulfur-diesel fuel, once feared by many truckers as potentially harmful to engines and fuel efficiency, will become by Dec. 1 the only legal fuel allowed for all on-highway diesel-powered vehicles.

After up to four years of experience with ULSD, truckers and trucking companies — including those with older trucks — appear to be much less worried about the possibility that the fuel will create overwhelming problems for their bottom lines. In fact, much of the industry appears to be embracing the new standards.

“We currently are not experiencing any issues with the low-sulfur diesel,” UPS Inc. spokeswoman Elizabeth Rasberry told Equipment & Maintenance Update. “Early on in the implementation, we put maintenance processes in place to help minimize any issues or concerns.”

“We have been using low-sulfur diesel since it was first available and have not identified any trends or failures in our fleet as a result of its use,” Doug Werts, FedEx Express planning and analysis senior manager of global vehicles, told EMU.

UPS and FedEx, which rank No. 1 and No. 2, respectively, on the list of the Transport Topics 100 largest for-hire carriers in the United States and Canada, are not the only companies that have expressed satisfaction with the performance of ULSD fuel.

“Actually, we’ve not seen any differences in performance with ULSD,” Dave Pettis, director of maintenance at J&R Schugel Trucking Inc., New Ulm, Minn., told EMU. “Our 2007 technology engines, the first ones built to run only on ULSD, are performing even better than the manufacturers told us they would, and older ones work just fine on low sulfur.”

Pettis said that the only concern that his shop had to be careful with was the type of engine oil it used.

“Oil companies developed a special oil mixture for ’07 engines and beyond called C-4, and it also works very well with the older engines,” Pettis said.

“But you can’t do it the other way,” he added. “You can’t put the older, pre-’07 engine oil into a 2007 platform. The driver will notice it, and it will really affect performance, and you have to change it immediately.”

And one owner-operator, considered the most cantankerous and resistant to new technology by some in the trucking community, just seemed to shrug his shoulders at the coming disappearance of higher sulfur diesel.

“I’ve got a year 2000 tractor and drive it all over the entire country,” John Paxton, Kinston, Ala., told EMU. “Ultra-low sulfur has never given my engine any trouble. In fact, I think it actually works better with it, though that’s only a subjective opinion.”

The opinions about ULSD fuel were not always so positive. In fact, at one time, many in the trucking industry were downright hostile toward the new fuel.

The first engines designed to run on only ULSD were introduced in the United States at the beginning of 2007 and carried price tags of up to $14,000 more than 2006 models because of the research and new devices that went into the much cleaner power plants. Aside from the added cost, many in the industry were worried about the fuel’s possible adverse effects, especially on pre-2007 engines (Transport Topics, 1-16-06, p. 1).

Today, the technology behind ULSD fuel and the engines designed to maximize its “green” potential has far fewer doomsayers. Even engine manufacturers appear confident that the fuel will not hinder the performance of their products, both new and old.

A specialist from Daimler Trucks North America said the transition to 100% ULSD will not be a problem for its older engines.

“The final transition to ULSD will not be a concern,” Brent Calcut, DTNA’s supervisor of chemical technologies and quality management for NAFTA, told EMU.

“Upgrading a refinery to make ULSD requires a major investment and significant lead time,” he added. “The majority of refineries actually converted to ULSD several months ahead of the October 2006 requirement that 80% of on-road diesel fuel needed to be ULSD.”

Calcut said that the EPA has tracked the percentage of ULSD versus 500 parts per million diesel over the past several years, and “the report from the end of 2009 claims that “96.1% of combined on-highway and non-road fuel will be ULSD in 2010.”

James McNamara, spokesman for Volvo Trucks North America, Greensboro, N.C., also said that his company’s older engines would have no trouble running on only ULSD.

“ULSD in older Volvo engines is a non-issue, since Sweden has mandated 10 ppm diesel fuel since 1990, so our engines have had the ability to run on ULSD for at least 20 years now,” McNamara told EMU.

Dawn Fenton, director of policy of the Diesel Technology Forum, Frederick, Md., said the new fuel and new engine conversions will cut emissions drastically.

“Using this ultra-low-sulfur diesel will immediately cut soot emissions from any diesel vehicle by 10%,” she told EMU. “And when combined with a new generation of engines and exhaust treatment, ULSD enables emissions reductions of over 95%.”

The fuel suppliers also have been doing their part to make the transition as smooth as possible. Truck stops, both independents and chains, have long been aware of their legal obligation to phase out 500 ppm and also express little concern.

Natso, the national trade association representing travel plaza and truck-stop owners and operators, also is not expecting problems.

“As far as changing over to ULSD goes, most of our members have already made the transition a while ago, because of the lack of availability of 500 ppm diesel and the large volume of 2007 trucks and newer on road, which can use only ultra-low-sulfur,” Holly Alfano, Natso’s vice president for government affairs, told EMU. “This coming deadline is not a big issue for our members.”

She added that they would be required to have warnings on their pumps by Dec. 1 that only ULSD would be legal for on-highway engines.

“I think that precisely because the EPA set out the rules so clearly and simply, this transition will be probably the easiest one that we’ve ever gone through regarding government mandates,” Bob Lee, president of Roady’s Truck Stops, Boise, Idaho, told EMU.

Lee said that the Roady’s network has more than 400 truck stops in 45 states. Unlike other chains, each Roady’s location and groups of locations are independently owned and operated, with members buying from management just the services and products they choose.

“Probably a majority of them have already migrated over to offering just ULSD, though we haven’t canvassed them,” Lee said. “Many of them have put out advertising advising truckers of the change.

“I’ve talked to dozens of managers, fuel cashiers and other employees where this advertising is up,” Lee said, “and they tell me universally that drivers just don’t care about the disappearance of other diesels.”

He said that he has moved up the date when Roady’s will make its final educational push to its members about the disappearance of higher fuel sulfur.

“Initially, I was going to wait till late summer to begin the push to advise them and make them aware of the change,” Lee said. “We have a magazine that we publish, and we decided to put in a major article about the change in our August-September issue, due out in midsummer.”

He said the transition would go much more smoothly than introduction of diesel exhaust fluid last year.