The Alliance for California Business, a non-profit that represents truckers, farmers, and other California business owners, says that mandated Diesel Particulate Filters (DPF) are to blame for the recent increase of semi truck fires in the state.
What’s worse, is they claim that the California Attorney General and the California Air Resources Board (CARB), the group that pushed for DEF filters to be required in all new trucks, have been covering up the dangers of the filters, and are stopping other groups from attempting to investigate the issue.
Bud Caldwell, the president of the group, said “These diesel particulate filters [DPFs] are the most dangerous pieces of equipment ever put on a truck.”
According to The Business Journal , there have been 31 truck fires “related to DPFs” in the last 18 months.
The most recent one caused four separate fires in San Juan Bautista, and left pieces of a DPF scattered on the road.
California is currentlly the only states that requires that commercial diesel vehicles be outfitted with the filters.
Another member of the group, Jim Ganduglia, the owner of a small trucking company in Fresno, says that he’s had several trucks shut down on him after the filters caused the truck to overheat.
The Alliance filed for an injunction against CARB earlier in the year, but it was declined after a judge claimed that the group did not present “a significant showing of irreparable injury” caused by the filters. However, the judge did add that “the possibility of these safety issues is very concerning.”
The group has hired outside experts and are in the process of conducting their own investigation to prove the dangers of DPFs, but have hit several road blocks after CARB blocked them from accessing police and fire reports of incidents involving trucks with DPF filters.
“For every fire suspected of being linked to the DPF device, the Alliance has requested police, fire and California Highway Patrol reports,” said Caldwell “For every subpoena issued by the Alliance for this information, CARB has filed objections to the disclosure — with no explanation to date for why it would not want that information disclosed to the Alliance and members of the public.”
“If the California Air Resources Board was genuinely concerned with the health and safety of citizens and not just with defending their mandate, why would they prevent anyone from looking into truck fires?” he added.
CARB declined to comment on the groups inquiry, other than saying the filters are “effective” in removing harmful diesel emissions.