10 fleets sign on to test their fuel efficiency in NACFE’s Run on Less Regional challenge

After a successful and informative Run on Less in 2017, the North American Council for Freight Efficiency (NACFE) has returned with a new run focusing on fleets running regional routes.

The Run on Less Regional event will take place over three weeks in October, beginning October 8 and ending later that month at the North American Commercial Vehicle Show, where NACFE will announce initial results of the run. Ten fleets have signed up for the regional run, including three that also participated in the 2017 long-haul run.

The 10 fleets (and home base where the truck will be based) involved in the Run on Less Regional challenge are:

  • C&S Wholesale Grocers (Hammond, Louisiana)
  • Hirschbach (Monterey, Tennessee)
  • Hogan Transportation (St. Louis, Missouri)
  • J.B. Hunt (NYSE: JBHT) (Corsicana, Texas)
  • Meijer (Lansing, Michigan)
  • PepsiCo’s (NASDAQ: PEP) snacks and beverages division (Vancouver, Washington)
  • Ploger Transportation (Norwalk, Ohio)
  • Schneider (NYSE: SNDR) (Rockford, Illinois)
  • Southeastern Freight Lines (Columbia, South Carolina)
  • UPS (NYSE: UPS) (Phoenix, Arizona)

Hirschbach, Ploger Transportation and PepsiCo are returning fleets.

“It’s really exciting to do this. Run on Less the first time really helped the industry,” Mike Roeth, NACFE executive director, said.

In 2017, NACFE along with Shell, Pepsi and the Carbon War Room, held the original Run on Less challenge. That challenge also ended at the North American Commercial Vehicle Show in Atlanta, with the trucks in the study averaging 10.1 mpg overall, with 12.8 the highest individual mpg and three different trucks posting days over 12.5 mpg. The lowest mpg from a truck was 7.1 on one of the days, and the average for all lowest mpgs throughout the Run was 8.8. Collectively, the trucks traveled 50,107 miles and saved 2,877 gallons of fuel and $7,183 over the national fleet-wide average of 6.4 mpg.

The fleets in the original study included owner-operators and company drivers of various-sized fleets up to one with more than 7,000-plus trucks. Drivers tracked their daily mileage during regular duty cycles, which included 31 of 99 total days operating at over 65,000 pounds. Trucks faced both headwinds and tailwinds from Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma, mountainous terrain and flat highways. All the trucks had different specifications. The only real requirement was that the technologies used on the trucks needed to be commercially available.