|
Earlier this month, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) proposed changes to emergency declarations. Under the new proposed regulation, Presidential declarations of emergency would continue to trigger a 30-day exemption from all FMCSRs in parts 390 through 399, but state and regional emergency declarations would waive hours only and would also limit the duration of the automatic regulatory relief for both intrastate and regional emergencies (for example, due to winter weather) to only 5 days rather than 30 days.
The regulation would maintain the statutory requirement created by the Reliable Home Heating Act that when a Governor declares a state of emergency due to a shortage of residential heating fuel, the automatic regulatory relief lasts for a period of 30 days and exempts any motor carrier or driver operating a CMV to provide residential heating fuel in the geographic area so designated as under a state of emergency from all regulations in parts 390 through 399. The initial automatic exemption may be extended two times by the Governor for a total of 90 days if the Governor determines that the emergency shortage has not ended.
The National Propane Gas Association (NPGA) has immediately jumped into action, meeting with key stakeholders and like-minded trade groups, setting a meeting with the FMCSA, and preparing a comment to the agency advocating against these changes, focused especially on opposing FMCSA’s proposed language to shorten the duration of the exemptions.
Because of the length of the regulatory process, NPGA does not expect this to impact this winter’s heating season. While NPGA assesses its comprehensive strategy, NPGA requests the industry channel any questions and suggestions to NPGA rather than FMCSA.
Separately, NPGA’s Special Exemption Waiver request, filed this fall, is still pending with the FMCSA. The proposed exemption would waive various hours-of-service (HOS) requirements to enable the propane industry to prepare and respond to periods of peak consumer demand.
| 
