CHICAGO -- Could you haul the same amount of freight using half the energy?

The Rocky Mountain Institute believes it’s possible and has assembled a new research team to determine exactly how it can be done.

RMI’s MOVE (MObility and Vehicle Efficiency) team is teaming up with trucking industry leaders to create the North American Council for Freight Efficiency (NACFE), with the goal of helping to reinvent the trucking industry to carry just as much freight on half as much energy.

The first meeting of the group will take place Nov. 3 in Chicago. The new group will collect, assess and circulate information on performance and efficiency benefits to technology developers, fleet owners and truck drivers.

“There is a lack of trustworthy information evaluating different technologies for fleets to make investment decisions,” said Hiroko Kawai, principal of RMI’s MOVE team. “The freight industry, and the trucking industry in particular, have been burned by a snake-oil salesman approach to technology, and it is difficult for end-users of innovative technologies to accelerate market adoption. The same challenges are also shared by producers of technologies; they cannot accelerate the market adoption of their R&D efforts, and it is hard for them to lead the market even when they offer the necessary innovations.”