Corporate sponsorship came from PACCAR and Eaton. Attendees not only included representatives from a variety of truck and truck parts manufacturers, but also about 100 truck and bus fleet managers, Van Amburg said.

"Hybrid trucks are five to 10 years behind the introduction of hybrid cars," he said. "We're trying to help policy makers know that we're going to make hybrid trucks into bigger market numbers."

WestStart-CALSTART is a nonprofit transportation technology organization made up of more than 145 companies, across North America and the world; with offices located in Pasadena, Calif., and Denver.

The Hybrid Truck Users Forum is just one of the major support activities that the consortium puts together. Jasna Tomic, with a Ph.D. in fuel sciences, coordinates research activities with national laboratories and companies that are members of the organization and some that are not.

"If you want to have hybrids, engage the politicians," King County (Wash.) Fleet Director Win Mitchell advised attendees during a panel discussion titled, "National Incentive Progress and Regional Incentives Progress."
King County Executive Ron Sims has given him a goal of reducing fossil fuel consumption by 35 percent by 2012, Mitchell said.

"Manufacturers had a problem with service if the trucks were sold over a large geographic area," he said. That led him to create the Northwest Hybrid Truck Consortium. "I found colleagues who were interested and put together a grant proposal to the EPA. I asked for $800,000 and got $400,000. I got 10 trucks with that.

"I see a consortium as a tool to move the market. It helps the manufacturers control service costs. It also reduces purchase costs (of hybrid trucks) to participants."

For the manufacturers, coming up with the technology is perhaps a bigger challenge, according to those who spoke in a presentation titled "Hybrid markets and the business case."

"The engine interface becomes a real challenge," said Jim Williams, director of sales and distribution of new products for International Truck and Engine Corp. "What you put on the back--maybe something like an emergency command center--is as much a challenge as the batteries."

When asked about the breakthrough point, in terms of the economies of scale, Williams said, "You don't have to get to huge volume--1,000 a year--before the economics start making sense."

Azure Dynamics' Senior Vice President for Sales Mark Federle said, "As more of these systems get out there, the cost will go down and there will be greater acceptance. Lithium-ion batteries have tremendous capabilities, and the cost is low with hybrids. We now have 220 pounds of batteries versus 3,000 pounds of batteries back in the day."

When one of those in the audience asked about how service would be handled, John Duffy, an engineer with Kenworth Truck Co., said, "We have to work through the dealer network to train the technicians. At the end of the day, it's no more difficult than working on a conventional diesel truck."

International's Jim Williams said, "Our training has three components. First, we have DVD training; second, we have hands-on, two-day training to support Eaton (Hybrid Power Systems) as they have asked us to at dealerships. And third, we have a hybrid school bus with two parallel training programs at our dealer networks."

Brad Bohlman, business development manager for Eaton Corp.'s Advanced Technology Team, said during a panel on "advanced and enabling technologies" that Eaton is making both hybrid-electric and hybrid-hydraulic systems. (Fourteen of the vehicles offered during the ride-and-drive segment were equipped with Eaton systems.)

In a hybrid-hydraulic system, diesel engines drive a hydraulic pump-motor, which in turn charges a high-pressure accumulator. That accumulator drives a bent-axis pump motor on the rear wheels to propel the vehicle; and a low-pressure reservoir completes the circuit, collecting the fluid before sending it back to the first pump-motor. Like electric hybrids, hydraulic hybrids also provide regenerative braking capabilities.

 
"An advanced series hybrid hydraulic United Parcel Service (UPS) truck in Washington, D.C., has achieved 50 to 70 percent fuel savings," Bohlman said. "Seventy percent of the brake energy can be regenerated with a parallel hybrid hydraulic system. There's a 20 to 30 percent fuel economy payback in just three years."

Sam Synder, chief engineer with Federal Express, who spoke during a presentation of the results of a field test conducted by WestStart-CALSTART's Tomic, said, "We need a supplier to provide a smaller and lighter hybrid platform and a lower-horsepower engine. We're using 200-HP, six-cylinder (internal combustion) engines because that's all that's available now for use as a hybrid."

In response to a question from the audience about costs, Synder said, "If you take a look at what it costs to put a hybrid system in an automobile, you'd get closer to the actual cost. We'd like to see a 20 percent mark-up. Right now, it's buy one hybrid or two conventional trucks; that's our choice."

Federal Express is currently field-testing a delivery van, Synder said, that's equipped with an Eaton 60-HP motor and generator setup, an automated manual transmission, and 340 lithium-ion batteries.

 
Eaton, Altec Industries and International personnel were all involved with recent field tests, Tomic said.
"Fuel consumption improvements varied from 14 to 54 percent, with different fleets," she said. "The duty cycle is important to get the results you want."