Trucking news & briefs for March 18, 2026:
- Legislation under active consideration could enshrine "self-certification for the use of [self-driving] heavy-duty trucks on our nation’s roads." --OOIDA letter to House Energy and Commerce
- NACFE 'Messy Middle' report findings showed high diesel efficiency (11.8 mpg) and narrow use cases and performance for alternative techs.
OOIDA voices opposition to 'SELF DRIVE' legislation intro'd early this year
As the Department of Transportation early this year was signaling a full-steam-ahead approach to encouraging autonomous driving tech, reps in Congress were working on a piece of legislation promoted as strengthening safety and clarifying National Highway Traffic Safety Administration authority over driverless-vehicle standards.
The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association recently wrote to Congress worrying over gaps in that legislation. Namely, a lack of oversight for vehicle-tech-developer safety certifications that might essentially enshrine "self-certification for the use of [self-driving] heavy-duty trucks on our nation’s roads."
While the bill's language requires developers of autonomous systems to make a safety case for their technology prior to deployment, OOIDA President Todd Spencer wrote in the letter, dated March 9, that "companies would not need to provide these cases to the government before deployment, or possibly even at all. These cases must only be submitted to DOT upon request."
With that kind of a certification regime in place, Spencer added, "there is no way for the public to know whether these vehicles will operate safely."
Congressman Bob Latta (R-Ohio) introduced H.R. 7390 early in February, calling it the "Safely Ensuring Lives Future Deployment and Research in Vehicle Evolution Act of 2026" to achieve the bill title's SELF DRIVE acronym. The bill was marked up in short order by a subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and now awaits action there with just two cosponsors.
Latta noted part of its aim is to underscore the U.S.'s "role in developing and regulating the autonomous vehicle framework" with hopes to "ensure innovation thrives here at home. Standing up to China means keeping these jobs in America and securing our position as a global leader in autonomous vehicle development and manufacturing."
OOIDA's letter to the committee, though, outlined the dangers of leaving too much to chance when it comes the self-certification the association sees in the provisions.
Spencer suggested Congress would do well to learn from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration's recent actions to clean up registries of self-certified electronic logging devices as well as CDL schools. Those efforts demonstrate "the importance of oversight and enforcement" when it comes to safety, Spencer said. "Regulatory verification and enforcement are critical to upholding safety standards."
H.R. 7390 would effectively do the opposite, in OOIDA's view.
"Instead of holding autonomous vehicles to similar standards, H.R. 7390 would permit the operation of driverless 80,000-pound trucks based on the unverified assertions of companies with a vested financial interest in their deployment," Spencer wrote.
The bill has received published endorsements from the Autonomous Vehicle Industry Association, Honda Motor Company, Tesla and other manufacturer and technology-developer interests.
Among chief related concerns, OOIDA's Spencer echoed Overdrive readers' worries over cybersecurity with respect to any autonomous, driverless vehicle, drawing a parallel to the ELD mandate's 2017-'19 implementation.
Regulators back then thought they had a strong system to foil hours of service cheaters only to see the rise in more recent times of back-end manipulation of the data in the devices to make ELD records look any way the manipulator wants them to look.
[Related: ELD tampering: CVSA drafts new bulletin to combat 'dangerous trend']
The situation is such that the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance is devoting part of its annual Roadcheck inspection blitz this year to hours of service enforcement, with a brand-new violation code for false logs as a result of electronic manipulation/tampering.
The SELF DRIVE legislation, Spencer argues in OOIDA's letter, "contains only vague and insufficient cybersecurity requirements that fail to ensure the safety and integrity of automated vehicle operations. The bill merely requires manufacturers to maintain a written cybersecurity policy outlining how they would 'detect and respond to cyber attacks, unauthorized intrusions, and false vehicle control commands,' without defining specific technical standards such a policy must meet."
The lack of specificity Spencer identifies raises the question of whether "these policies would actually prevent or mitigate cyber-attacks, or whether manufacturers could even execute their stated plans since the bill does not require them to prove compliance or verify cybersecurity protections are functioning as intended."
OOIDA found troubling lack of any requirement for public disclosure by manufacturers/developers of "cyber intrusions, nor any mandate that companies suspend operations or take vehicles offline in the event of a cyber incident. As written, the legislation grants manufacturers significant discretion while offering the public little transparency or assurance that cybersecurity threats are being addressed promptly or appropriately."
As illustrated above, Overdrive surveys of its mostly owner-operator readership in 2025 showed a third of respondents earmarking cyberattack risks of chief concern with autonomous tech. Roughly a fourth felt truly driverless trucks were "one big accident away from being banned."
Access those results via this link to prior coverage. Text of the current version of H.R. 7930 you can find via this link.
[Related: Aurora adds 1K-mile 'driverless' lane: Will HOS regs apply for the in-cab observer?]
'Messy middle' real-world test of alternative truck-power plants underscores big diesel efficiency gains
The North American Council for Freight Efficiency (NACFE) released the second report from its Run on Less real-world test of 14 Class 8 tractors operated by 13 participating fleets, with four different energy pathways:
- Diesel/renewable diesel/biodiesel
- Compressed natural gas/renewable natural gas
- Battery electric
- Hydrogen fuel-cell
The "Terrain, Technology, and Telematics: The Messy Middle Operations Report" is available for download via the NACFE Run on Less hub.
The report delivers cross-fleet insights into data provided by the various powertrain types, as well as a cross-fleet comparative analysis across all fuels. Data confirm a central reality, NACFE said. "There is no single technology capable of addressing every freight application with optimal economics, environmental performance, and operational simplicity."
What's more, ever-growing efficiency is diesel-powered trucks themselves is illustrated clearly, with a benchmark 11.8 mpg for participating trucks on the high end. Key findings are shown in the image below.
Find the full report via this link.
[Related: Diesel soars past $5/gal. nationally, rates rise to respond]
