[Federal Register Volume 61, Number 192 (Wednesday, October 2, 1996)]
[Notices]
[Pages 51486-51489]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 96-25183]


-----------------------------------------------------------------------

DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION
Federal Highway Administration
[FHWA Docket No. MC-96-45]


Winter Home Heating Oil Delivery State Flexibility Program; Hours 
of Service

AGENCY: Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), DOT.

ACTION: Notice; Request for comment.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

SUMMARY: The FHWA is requesting comments on the development and 
implementation of a Winter Home Heating Oil Delivery State Flexibility 
Program (Heating Oil Program) for motor carriers making intrastate home 
heating oil deliveries within a 100 air-mile radius of a central 
terminal or distribution point. As mandated by the National Highway 
System Designation Act of 1995 (NHS Act), the FHWA must select up to 5 
States to participate. These States would permit drivers of commercial 
motor vehicles (CMVs) making intrastate home heating oil deliveries to 
end any period of 7 or 8 consecutive days with the beginning of an off-
duty period of 24 or more consecutive hours. The program will begin 
November 1, 1996, and end April 30, 1997.

DATES: Comments must be received on or before November 1, 1996.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mr. Nathan C. Root, Office of Motor 
Carrier Research and Standards, (202) 366-8759, or Mr. Charles Medalen, 
Office of the Chief Counsel, (202) 366-1354, Federal Highway 
Administration, DOT, 400 Seventh Street, SW., Washington, D.C. 20590. 
Office hours are from 7:45 a.m. to 4:15 p.m., e.t., Monday through 
Friday, except Federal holidays.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

Background

I. The NHS Act of 1995

    Section 346 of the National Highway System Designation Act of 1995 
(Pub. L. 104-59, 109 Stat. 568, 615, November 28, 1995, 49 U.S.C. 31136 
note) requires the Secretary of Transportation to develop and implement 
a Winter Home Heating Oil Delivery State Flexibility Program (Heating 
Oil Program). The program would permit any period of 7 or 8 consecutive 
days to end for any driver who has been off-duty for a period of 24 or 
more consecutive hours for the purposes of determining maximum on-duty 
time under 49 CFR 395.3(b) for drivers of vehicles making intrastate 
home heating oil deliveries within 100 air-miles of a central terminal 
or distribution point of the delivery of such oil. The NHS Act allows 
the Secretary to approve up to 5 States to participate in the program 
during the winter heating season beginning November 1, 1996, without 
jeopardizing Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program (MCSAP) funding to 
those States. The participating States would have to meet criteria set 
forth in the NHS Act. This includes having a substantial number of 
citizens relying upon home heating oil, indicating the current hours-
of-service regulations may endanger the welfare of these citizens by 
impeding timely deliveries of home heating oil, and ensuring that 
participating motor carriers maintain a level of safety equal to or 
greater than that produced by compliance with the current regulations 
through proper monitoring of their safety performance and reporting 
their performance to the FHWA.
    Under the Heating Oil Program, the States will limit participation 
to those motor carriers with CMVs that make intrastate home heating oil 
deliveries within a 100 air-mile radius of a central terminal or 
distribution point. The relief provided by the program will be 
effective for 15-day or 30-day increments during the period from 
November 1, 1996 to April 30, 1997. Participating States must submit a 
plan to the FHWA describing the conditions of eligibility for 
participating carriers and the means the State will employ to monitor 
performance, mitigate safety risks, and evaluate the merits of the 
program. Each State would accept responsibility for monitoring the 
performance of the motor carriers it determines to be eligible and for 
enforcing the conditions it imposes.
    Participating States will allow drivers making intrastate home 
heating oil deliveries within 100 air-miles of a central terminal or 
distribution point to end any period of 7 or 8 consecutive days after 
having been off-duty for a period of 24 or more consecutive hours for 
the purposes of determining maximum on-duty time under 49 CFR 395.3(b), 
or the equivalent State requirement. This will effectively allow 
drivers and motor carriers to ``restart'' calculations for the 60-hour 
and 70-hour rules after an off-duty period of 24 or more consecutive 
hours. This concept is commonly referred to as a ``24-hour restart.''
    The NHS Act directs the FHWA to initiate a rulemaking within 90 
days after completion of the program to determine, based in part on the 
results of the program, whether granting waivers of the hours-of-
service regulations to motor carriers of home heating oil within the 
borders of a State, or to amend the hours-of-service regulations to 
provide flexibility to

[[Page 51487]]

motor carriers delivering home heating oil during winter periods of 
peak demand, would be consistent with safety.

II. Hours of Service Regulations

    The hours-of-service regulations are intended to provide motor 
carriers and drivers with a framework for ensuring driver alertness. 
The first hours-of-service regulations for the motor carrier industry 
were promulgated in the late 1930's by the Interstate Commerce 
Commission. The last substantive changes to the hours-of-service 
regulations as we know them today (the 10-hour, 15-hour, and 60/70-hour 
rules) occurred in the early 1960's. These rules were adopted by the 
FHWA in 1966 when the Congress created the Department of 
Transportation. Currently, drivers may not drive more than 10 hours 
following 8 consecutive hours off-duty, nor may drivers drive for any 
period after having been on-duty 15 hours following 8 consecutive hours 
off-duty. These are the 10-hour and 15-hour rules. For motor carriers 
that do not operate CMVs every day of the week, drivers may not drive 
after having been on-duty 60 hours in any 7 consecutive days. For motor 
carriers that do operate CMVs every day of the week, their drivers may 
not drive after having been on-duty 70 hours in any period of 8 
consecutive days. The 70-hour motor carriers may, at their option, 
designate drivers that do not operate every day of the week to utilize 
the 60-hour rule instead. These are the 60/70-hour rules.
    The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations (FMCSRs) generally 
serve to increase the safety of all classes of motor carriers and CMV 
operators. However, during the winter months, home heating oil 
deliverers find it difficult to deliver an essential product in a 
timely manner under the current hours-of-service regulations. During 
the winter months, home supplies of heating oil typically run low and 
home heating oil deliverers are more likely to run into conflicts with 
the hours-of-service regulations. The same severe weather also hinders 
deliveries of heating oil by slowing the rate of travel for traffic in 
general, thereby extending the time required to make deliveries of home 
heating oil and aggravating hours-of-service conflicts.

III. State Flexibility

Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program
    The FMCSRs, including the hours-of-service restrictions, generally 
apply to interstate transportation. The Motor Carrier Safety Assistance 
Program (MCSAP) was established by the Congress in 1982 to encourage 
States to adopt and enforce these regulations by providing grants to 
participating States. The intended effect is to expand the enforcement 
of Federal safety standards for interstate transportation and to make 
similar standards applicable to intrastate CMVs and drivers through 
compatible State regulations. The States must agree to adopt and 
enforce generally uniform safety regulations as a condition for the 
receipt of funds. The MCSAP funds are used to support salaries, 
equipment, and training of State enforcement officers. The data 
collected by the States are shared on a national basis and used by the 
FHWA as the basis for its safety rating, review, and enforcement 
programs. Through the MCSAP, the FHWA and its State partners have 
developed a uniform program of safety compliance and enforcement for 
drivers and CMVs that has brought about substantial decreases in CMV-
related crashes since the program's inception.
    Great strides have been made in achieving motor carrier regulation 
uniformity in all States. The Heating Oil Program will allow a limited 
number of States that depend heavily on fuel oil for residential 
heating to grant limited relief from the 60-hour and 70-hour rules 
during the winter months without jeopardizing their MCSAP funding. This 
relief would only apply to the intrastate delivery operations of 
participating motor carriers. Drivers operating in interstate commerce 
would not be able to participate. Some flexibility in the application 
of the FMCSRs to intrastate transportation is currently provided in the 
Tolerance Guidelines (49 CFR Part 350, Appendix C). The data gathered 
during this program will be used to determine whether a limited 
exception to the hours-of-service rules for the heating oil industry 
during the winter months has a significant adverse impact upon public 
safety.
Initiation and Termination of Heating Oil Program
    The NHS Act directs the Secretary to select up to 5 States to 
participate in the program for an initial period of 15 days during the 
winter heating season. If the Secretary finds that a State's continued 
participation in the program has not resulted in a significant adverse 
impact upon public safety and is in the public interest, the Secretary 
shall extend the State's participation in the program for 30-day 
periods. Accordingly, the FHWA will require each participating State to 
submit a preliminary report of its evaluation of carrier performance 
after the initial 15 days. A State's participation in the program may 
be suspended at any time if: (1) The State has not complied with any 
criteria established for participation in the program; (2) The motor 
carriers found eligible by the State are causing a significant adverse 
impact upon public safety; or (3) The State elects to end its 
participation in the program on its own initiative.
    Participating States must monitor the safety performance of 
participating motor carriers and periodically report this information 
to the FHWA. The FHWA may suspend the program in any individual State 
where the motor carriers in the program are causing a significant 
adverse impact upon public safety. Such a determination may be made at 
any time during the program. Each participating State would similarly 
suspend program involvement of motor carriers that fail to continue to 
meet certain safety levels at any time during the program. Each State 
will need to determine what safety levels motor carriers must maintain 
to continue operating under this program.
    Given the fact that program participation may be suspended at any 
time during the program for individual carriers or for an entire State, 
the FHWA requests comment on the requirement that extensions be granted 
to the States every 30 days. How burdensome would this process be? Is 
there any value added to the program or to public safety by requiring 
extensions be granted every 30 days for States to continue 
administering regulatory relief to program carriers?
Safety Performance Monitoring Activities
    Participating States must monitor and evaluate the performance of 
motor carriers involved in this program. Each State should be able to 
present data indicating any changes in safety levels of participating 
motor carriers at the end of the initial 15-day period, at the end of 
each 30-day period, and at the completion of the program. These 
evaluations may be accomplished by comparing safety performance levels 
of the motor carrier during the program to past performance in the 
previous winter(s), safety performance of other similar industries 
during the same period, or by using a study control group among the 
participating motor carriers. Any other method of producing a reliable 
and accurate evaluation of performance during the waived period may be 
used. Each participating State must indicate the method(s) that will be 
used to monitor and evaluate safety performance when they apply to the 
FHWA to participate in the program.

[[Page 51488]]

IV. State Participation

    The NHS Act directs the Secretary to approve a State for 
participation in the Heating Oil Program only if the State's 
application demonstrates the following:
    1. A substantial number of the citizens of the State must rely on 
home heating oil for heat during winter months;
    2. The current maximum on-duty time regulations may endanger the 
welfare of the State's citizens by impeding timely delivery of home 
heating oil;
    3. The level of safety with respect to home heating oil deliveries 
will be equal to or greater than the level of safety resulting from 
compliance with the current hours-of-service regulations under 49 CFR 
395.3(b);
    4. The State agrees to monitor the safety of home heating oil 
deliveries while participating in the program and issue program status 
reports to the FHWA on a periodic basis to be defined in an agreement 
with the FHWA;
    5. The home heating oil carriers covered by the program will agree 
to make all safety data required as a condition of participation 
available to the State and the FHWA;
    6. The participating motor carriers must meet the eligibility 
criteria indicated below in Section VI (Motor Carrier Eligibility).
    Pilot programs of this nature are ideally comprised of States 
representative of the various regions of the U.S. However, the single 
most limiting criteria from the NHS Act is the first: a substantial 
number of the citizens of the State must rely on home heating oil for 
heat during winter months. For the purposes of the Heating Oil Program, 
the FHWA proposes to define ``a substantial number of citizens relying 
on home heating oil'' to be at least 20% of the households in a State 
relying on home heating oil. The FHWA believes less than 20%, or one 
out of every five households in a State relying on home heating oil, 
would not qualify as substantial. The FHWA welcomes comments upon this 
level being used to define a ``substantial number of citizens relying 
on home heating oil.''
    The Energy Information Administration of the U.S. Department of 
Commerce published a document entitled Fuel Oil and Kerosene Sales 
1994, which reports the number of gallons sold to residential consumers 
in each State. The U.S. Census Bureau has documented numbers of persons 
and households for each State. The Consumer Energy Council of America 
Research Foundation (the Council) also published a technical support 
document for a consumer decision-making guide on fuel switching and 
home energy conservation (revised January 31, 1994). In this document, 
the Council estimated that an average low efficiency house consumes 
approximately 857 gallons of heating oil per year (120 million BTU). 
The Council also estimated an average high efficiency house consumes 
approximately 607 gallons per year (85 million BTU). Sales data for 
1994 showing total gallons of fuel oil sold for residential consumption 
by State, divided by these two heating oil consumption figures, 
provides upper and lower boundaries for the estimated number of 
households per State that rely upon heating oil. An approximate 
percentage of homes that depend upon heating oil may be derived by 
comparing this data with 1990 U.S. Census data reporting the total 
number of households per State.
    The table below shows calculations for the States with the highest 
volume of fuel oil sales to residential consumers. A copy of the 
documents referred to above will be placed in the public docket MC-96-
45 for review. A copy of the document Fuel Oil and Kerosene Sales 1994 
(September 1995; GPO Stock No.: 061-003-00928-0) may also be obtained 
from the Government Printing Office at (202) 512-1800. Data from the 
U.S. Census may be obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau's 1990 Census 
Lookup, accessible via the internet at http://venus.census.gov/cdrom/
lookup on the World Wide Web.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                         1,000s gallons                                              Estimated  
                                             sold to                       Estimated households     households  
                 State                     residential   1990 Census: #    depending on heating    depending on 
                                         consumers 1994    Households     oil, 1994  (to nearest    heating oil 
                                              data                                 100)              (percent)  
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ME.....................................         236,631         465,729  276,000-390,000                59-84   
CT.....................................         526,930       1,203,243  615,000-868,000                51-72   
VT.....................................          90,930         210,633  106,000-150,000                50-71   
RI.....................................         147,504         377,080  172,000-243,000                46-64   
NH.....................................         159,963         411,387  187,000-264,000                45-64   
MA.....................................         828,893       2,244,406  967,000-1,366,000              43-61   
NJ.....................................         517,534       2,794,316  604,000-852,000                22-31   
PA.....................................         830,250       4,492,958  969,000-1,368,000              22-30   
NY.....................................       1,122,298       6,634,434  1,310,000-1,849,000            20-28   
WI.....................................         201,247       1,824,252  235,000-332,000                13-18   
VA.....................................         206,078       2,294,722  241,000-340,000                11-15   
MN.....................................         141,937       1,648,825  166,000-234,000                10-14   
NC.....................................         136,622       2,517,098  159,000-225,000                  6-9   
OH.....................................         205,280       4,089,312  240,000-338,000                  6-8   
MI.....................................         169,100       3,424,122  197,000-279,000                  6-8   
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Based upon this data, the FHWA estimates that less than 20% of the 
households of any State outside the Northeast region depend on home 
heating oil. Participating States would therefore be limited to the 
Northeast region. The FHWA has already received letters of interest 
from New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania in advance of this notice. 
The FHWA invites these States and others to comment upon the criteria 
proposed for State participation.

V. State Application

    States that meet the eligibility criteria and wish to participate 
must submit an application to the FHWA that includes an implementation 
plan describing the conditions of eligibility for a motor carrier to 
participate. Applications should be sent during the comment period, or 
as soon as possible after the comment period has closed, to the USDOT/
FHWA, Office of Motor Carrier Research and Standards, 400 Seventh 
Street, SW., Washington D.C. 20590, Attention: HCS-10. The minimum 
conditions stated in Section VI (Motor Carrier Eligibility) must be met 
and may be expanded upon. The plan must also include the means a State 
will employ to monitor performance of participating

[[Page 51489]]

carriers, mitigate safety risks, and evaluate the merits of the program 
in their State. As part of the implementation plan, each State would 
accept responsibility for monitoring the performance of the motor 
carriers it determines to be eligible and for enforcing the conditions 
it imposes.
    The proposed implementation plan requirements meet the conditions 
imposed by the NHS Act, in that States would be required to ensure a 
level of safety for home heating oil deliveries equal to or greater 
than the level of safety resulting from compliance with the current 60-
hour and 70-hour rules. The States would also be required to monitor 
the safety of home heating oil deliveries while participating in the 
program. The FHWA welcomes any comments on the appropriateness, 
suitability, or burden of these requirements.

VI. Motor Carrier Eligibility

    To be eligible for participation, a motor carrier would have to be 
actively engaged in making intrastate deliveries of home heating oil 
within a 100 air-mile radius of a central terminal or distribution 
point. Additionally, a motor carrier could not have a current safety 
rating of ``Unsatisfactory'' assigned by the FHWA, or a State-assigned 
equivalent rating. Participating States would be allowed to establish 
any additional criteria for participation.

VII. Final Evaluation of the Program

    The NHS Act requires the FHWA to conduct an evaluation at the 
conclusion of the program. The principal objective of the evaluation is 
to provide input to a zero-based review of the need for, and the cost 
and benefits of, the hours-of-service regulations as they apply to home 
heating oil delivery operations during the winter months. The NHS Act 
requires the FHWA to initiate rulemaking to determine, based in part 
upon the results of the program, whether to continue State-granted 
waivers of the hours-of-service regulations to motor carriers 
transporting home heating oil during the winter months, or to amend the 
hours-of-service regulations to provide flexibility to motor carriers 
delivering home heating oil during winter periods of peak demand.

VIII. Conclusion

    After the FHWA reviews the timely comments to this Notice, it will 
publish a Notice of Final Determination finalizing all aspects of this 
Project.

(23 U.S.C. 315; 49 CFR 1.48)

    Issued on: September 25, 1996.
Rodney E. Slater,
Federal Highway Admistrator.
[FR Doc. 96-25183 Filed 10-1-96; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4910-22-P