OTTAWA — A briefing from the Conference Board of Canada says emissions from heavy trucks is a problem effectively being ignored in North America.

The report, entitled ‘Freight Trucks and Climate Change Policy Mitigating CO2 Emissions,’ suggests the situation needs to be addressed with concerted efforts from the Canadian and U.S. governments.

"Greenhouse gas emissions from trucks are a significant and growing share of emissions, yet strategies to mitigate such emissions have received relatively little attention," the report states. "Despite impressive improvements in fuel and engine efficiency, truck-generated emissions of CO2 are likely to increase — making this an important area for policy attention."

The report is authored by Stephen Blank, professor of Canada-U.S. business and economic relations at Western Washington University, and a senior fellow of the Centre for International Governance and Innovation (CIGI).

Blank warns policy makers to be careful that solutions to the problem of dirty trucks don’t create new problems "down the line." "We must develop systemic approaches to mitigating truck-generated GHG emissions.

This means approaching the challenges in terms of an interconnected North American network in which changes at one point affect all other points," he writes. "We need to pay more attention to what others — particularly in Europe –are doing, and learn from their experiences."

He writes that some solutions can be put in place quickly and inexpensively. Others can be introduced but will be more transformational, costly, and longer term. He says his report is intended to highlight the gap between existing literature about how to mitigate GHG emissions, and the lack of "equitable, and feasible responses by business leaders and policy makers to the GHG challenge."

According to Blank, discussions in North America about freight transportation and climate change have tended to focus on a particular method for carbon mitigation — alternative fuels, new engine technologies, a carbon tax, or a cap-and-trade policy for the sector.

"The discussions have not, however, focused much attention on how long it would take to bring any of these approaches online or on the system-wide implications in doing so. Nor has there been much discussion about building a strategy that would attract sufficient stakeholder and political support to get any of these measures through the policy-making process."