It’s no secret that some of the major impediments facing the electric vehicle (EV) industry – with range and sticker price among them – all largely devolve from the limitations imposed by today’s battery technology.

For starters, batteries are incredibly expensive – especially the lithium-ion types now being favored by automakers – and they are going to remain pricey for some time as a variety of companies continue seeking ways to boost battery power density while reducing weight simultaneously.

That means, for the foreseeable future, battery technology development is going to remain locked in the research and development stage – not a stage that makes EV pricing attractive to everyday motorists. (more…)

Despite a truly knockout employment report last month, many clouds still darken the U.S. economy’s horizon – and that of the world’s as well.

This uncertainty is in no small measure being largely driven by the European sovereign debt crisis (a situation I am sure everyone is VERY tired of hearing and talking about) but other concerns are also in play – a big one being a sharp uptick in U.S. state and local taxes, combined with what’s become a long slow decline in real incomes, reducing consumer spending.

Those issues, in turns, are making corporate CEOs less sanguine about future prospects – and if they (and thus their companies) begin hunkering down, freight volumes might start dropping as well. (more…)

It’s a truck! No, it’s a boat! No, it’s the AMPHITRUCK! Agggghhhhh!

Actually, in all seriousness, this is a pretty neat – and unusual – piece of equipment. Built around the proprietary High Speed Amphibian (HSA) technology developed by the Gibbs Amphibians company, the Phibian (pictured at right) joins the firm’s Humdinga as some of the only truly “multi-modal” trucks that can operate easily on either roadways and waterways with but the flick of a switch.

[If you want to view more photos of the Phibian, click here.]

Obviously, both the Phibian and Humdinga (now THERE is a truck model name you won’t soon forget!) were developed primarily for military and search-and-rescue operations, but the company believes there are plenty of commercial applications for these vehicles as well – especially for delivering cargo to hard-to-reach rural areas. (more…)

There’s a wry (and ancient) Chinese curse that I am sure Kyle Treadway (at right), the outgoing chairman of the American Truck Dealers (ATD) trade group can fully appreciate: “May you live in interesting times.”

Indeed, Treadway’s four-year term as ATD’s chairman (his nominal two-year added to another left vacant by a member unable to serve) occurred during some of the most tumultuous economic times ever experienced by the trucking industry – much less our nation.

Yet despite the hammer blows delivered by the oil price shock of 2008, the “Great Recession,” the implementation of the super-strict 2010 emission reduction mandates, formation of the first ever heavy truck fuel economy mandates and much, much more, truck dealers – like truckers themselves – soldiered onward, albeit in many cases in very reduced numbers.

“As you all well know, it’s been an amazing ride – not for the fainthearted,” Treadway noted in his final speech at ATD’s convention in Las Vegas this week. “Between the relentless waves of government regulations altering the engineering and cost of our equipment, the collapse of the housing and construction markets, the whipsaw effect of fuel pricing and the manic-depressive stock market, we have witnessed the demise and rebirth of our economy, industry and markets.” (more…)

Ken Orski (at right) is no stranger to this space. Indeed, Orski – who served as associate administrator of the Urban Mass Transportation Administration under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford and now publishes a transportation newsletter – has forgotten more about transportation and infrastructure needs than most folks know.

He recently penned an interesting column for Public Works Financing, noting that U.S. infrastructure needs – from water and sewer systems to roadways and bridges – are floundering in a sea of ignorance.

Indeed, a column written in the Washington Post by Charles Lane last year – and the writers who vigorously responded to him – puts in sharp relief the attitude of most Americans when it comes to the state of our roadways and bridges: they seem to look OK, so why do we need to spend money on them? (more…)

The “Super Bowl” is more than the culmination of the National Football League (NFL) season and one of the most watched televised spectacles in the world (though soccer is by far the more popular global sport … just sayin’!). It’s also considered the ultimate moment in television advertising – and not just for the price tag, which is a record $3.5 million per 30 second slot this year. (Whooooo daddy!)

For this is moment when advertising agencies and their clients alike pull out all the creative stops and try to come up with something that not only captures the imagination of TV viewers during the game, but then goes “viral” on the Internet … getting watched (and talked about) over and over again via Youtube, Facebook, etc.

That’s what happened to Volkswagen and Chrysler last year, whose Super Bowl ads not only made a big splash during last year’s matchup between Green Bay and Pittsburgh, but ended the year two of the highest rates advertisements for all of 2011. (more…)

Despite the confidence expressed by the self-titled “most conservative members of the U.S. Senate” above, there’s not much hope out there that either of the proposed highway bills – the two-year $109 billion bill now working its way through the Senate and the five-year $260 billion plan unveiled in the House of Representatives this week – can be approved by Congress this year; much less even reconciled, I fear.

[Inhofe is not nearly as pessimistic, as you can see in the video clip below.]

The biggest sticking point between the two bills (no surprise here) is money. With fuel tax increases largely off the table, Congress is suggesting some very different ways to try and attain what it (and many in the transportation industry) believes is an adequate level of highway funding. (more…)

“Optimism among U.S. industrial manufacturers regarding the prospects for the U.S. economy over the next 12 months rose to 30% in the fourth quarter of 2011 – up from only 5% in the third quarter of 2011.” –from PricewaterhouseCoopers’ fourth quarter Manufacturing Barometer survey

For truckers trying to read the economic tea leaves to figure out what direction freight volumes might be headed in, there isn’t much clarity to be found of late.

For example, take the quotes above – one from the latest World Economic Outlook update compiled by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the other gleaned from a quarterly survey of manufacturers conducted by global consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).

They only scratch the surface of the iceberg in terms of uncertainty plaguing the global economy right now, as portents of doom are being issued right alongside a sudden surge in confidence about the business opportunities ahead.

The gloom of course derives from the still precarious sovereign debt situation in Europe; a region of the world the IMF now believes is headed for a recession this year. The international entity slashed its economic growth outlook for the “Euro zone” this month, predicting a drop in economic output of 0.5% for the region in 2012 – a decline of 1.6% from its outlook last year – and only meager growth of 0.8% in 2013, a decline of 0.7% from previous estimates. (more…)

It’s no great surprise that energy policy took a front seat in President Obama’s State of the Union address for the third year in a row. And certainly no shock should be registered that many of the policies advocated by the president in his speech contradict the actions of his administration over the past three years as well.

I mean, how else is one to hear and read of his goal to “boost domestic oil and natural gas production” when projects such as the Keystone XL pipeline are tabled, offshore drilling permits are banned, and the President himself again calls for the cancellation of tax breaks for oil and gas companies – even as such tax breaks are established (and federal loans given) to the so called “green” energy sector?

Well, that’s how it goes when energy and politics collide.

Yet no amount of political bickering can obscure the most salient (and frightening) fact about energy as it relates to our country: it remains one of our most vulnerable weak spots. Thus anything we as a nation can do to not only reduce energy consumption but change the kinds of energy we consume remains a welcome target for the U.S. to aim at.

“Oil plays a role in almost everything we do,” explained retired U.S. Air Force General John W. Handy, former Commander of the U.S. Transportation Command and co-chairman of the Energy Security Leadership Council (ESLC); a group which seeks to wean the U.S. off foreign oil import. (more…)

Is it any surprise that faith in government institutions worldwide is on the rocks? Or that trust in business, particularly CEOs, is waning as well? I’d think that neither finding would shock anyone at this point, considering the utter economic and political mess we’ve been wading through over the last three years – particularly as, in many respects, the mess isn’t going to be cleaned up any time soon.

Leafing through the 2012 Edelman Trust Barometer – the global public relations firm’s 12th annual trust and credibility survey – you’ll find that blame for the financial and political chaos of 2011 is being placed squarely on the doorstep of government, with trust in government falling a record nine points to 43% globally. (more…)