Fee Collection Begins for Ports' Clean Trucks Program
The new Clean Trucks Program was launched at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach on Oct. 1, but no fee-collecting system has been in place to fund the operation.
That will change on Nov. 17, when both ports will have a program ready to start charging the $70-per-40-foot container fee (and $35 for a 20-foot container) that is expected to finance the $2 billion Clean Trucks Program.
The Clean Trucks Program, adopted by both ports, stipulates that the 16,000 trucks hauling cargo at the ports be eventually replaced with newer, less-polluting models. Starting Oct. 1, the program immediately bans trucks built before 1989. By 2012, the program bars any trucks that don’t meet 2007 emission standards. The ports’ Clean Truck fees will help buy or subsidize newer models for some companies.
The new Clean Trucks fee-collecting system, called PortCheck, is similar to the PierPass system, which is used by terminal operators to charge fees for shippers picking up cargo during peak daytime hours rather than off-peak nighttime hours. Cargo owners already registered with PierPass will be automatically uploaded into the PortCheck program.
Meanwhile, the federal government has jumped into the controversial Clean Trucks Program debate. On Oct. 31, the Federal Maritime Commission filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., objecting to a portion of the program mandating that truck drivers picking up cargo at the Port of Los Angeles must be fully employed by a truck company or a concessionaire. The Port of Long Beach does not have that stipulation, but it is a requirement at the Port of Los Angeles.
The commission believes that requiring only fully employed truckers rather than independent operators reduces competition in the trucking industry and results in an unreasonable increase in transportation costs. —Deborah Belgum
