National Tank Truck Carriers Names Jeremy Mairs Chairman

What does the new NTTC chairman bring to the role?

Jeremy Mairs, president and CEO of Cox Petroleum, is now chairman of the National Tank Truck Carriers. Mairs grew up in the industry and brings direct experience operating under California's emissions and safety regulations, which often preview federal rules by several years.

The NTTC represents tank truck fleets hauling petroleum, chemicals, and other bulk liquids. The association's chairman typically serves a two-year term and sets the policy agenda for an industry that faces distinct equipment challenges: specialized tank construction, vapor-recovery systems, rollover stability requirements, and compartmentalized weight distribution that complicates axle-load compliance.

Why California experience matters for tank truck equipment

Mairs runs a fleet in California, where tank trucks must meet the state's Heavy-Duty Omnibus rule. That regulation phases in 2027 NOx standards three years ahead of the federal EPA timeline and requires zero-emission drayage tractors in certain ports. Tank trucks serving California terminals already face questions about whether battery-electric tractors can handle the weight of a loaded compartmentalized tank and still meet bridge-formula limits.

California also enforces stricter vapor-recovery standards at loading racks. Fleets operating there have had to retrofit older tanks with Stage II vapor-recovery hardware or retire units that cannot be economically upgraded. That experience gives Mairs a working knowledge of compliance costs that other regions will face as EPA tightens volatile organic compound rules.

What is on the NTTC agenda for the next two years

Mairs outlined his priorities in a podcast with Bulk Transporter. The specifics were not detailed in the source, but NTTC's recent focus areas include driver retention (which affects equipment utilization rates), insurance costs (which spike after a single rollover incident involving a tank truck), and federal hours-of-service flexibility for specialized hauling.

Tank truck fleets also watch EPA's renewable fuel standard closely. Changes to the RFS affect what products move by tank truck and where. If the EPA expands the renewable diesel blending mandate, fleets may need to add heated tanks or upgrade seals and gaskets to handle biodiesel blends above B20, which can degrade older elastomers.

How tank truck equipment differs from dry van and flatbed

Tank trucks carry liquid cargo that shifts during braking and cornering, which changes the vehicle's center of gravity in real time. That makes electronic stability control and roll-stability systems more critical than on a dry van. FMCSA's 2017 mandate for ESC on new tractors helped, but older tank trucks without factory ESC remain in service, and aftermarket retrofits are expensive.

Compartmentalized tanks also complicate weight distribution. A driver loading four compartments with different products (gasoline, diesel, ethanol, jet fuel) must calculate axle weights for each load configuration. Mistakes lead to overweight citations or, worse, a shifted load that destabilizes the truck mid-trip. Some fleets now use onboard weight sensors that feed data to the driver's ELD, but adoption is uneven among small tank truck operators.

Tank construction itself is a maintenance cost driver. Aluminum tanks are lighter but more expensive to repair after a collision. Steel tanks are cheaper upfront but add 1,500 to 2,000 pounds to the tare weight, cutting payload. Stainless steel is required for certain chemical hauls and costs more than either. Mairs' fleet operates in a state where every pound of tare weight matters because California's diesel fuel tax is the highest in the nation, and payload efficiency directly affects per-gallon operating cost.

What this means for tank truck fleets

Mairs takes over NTTC at a time when tank truck operators face equipment decisions with long payback periods. A new tank trailer costs $60,000 to $90,000 depending on compartment count and material. That trailer will stay in service 15 to 20 years if maintained properly. Fleets ordering now must guess whether future EPA vapor-recovery rules or state-level zero-emission mandates will obsolete the spec before the trailer is paid off.

Small tank truck operators also face a parts-availability problem. Specialized tank components like API adapters, emergency shutoff valves, and vapor-recovery couplings are not stocked at every truck stop. A vapor valve failure can ground a truck until the part ships, and downtime on a tank truck costs more than on a dry van because the cargo is time-sensitive and the customer often has no backup supplier.

Mairs' California background suggests NTTC may push for longer phase-in timelines on federal emissions rules and more flexibility in how fleets comply. Whether that translates into actual regulatory relief depends on how much weight NTTC carries in EPA and FMCSA rulemaking, but the association has historically been effective at securing carve-outs for specialized equipment when it can demonstrate that a one-size-fits-all rule creates safety or economic problems for tank truck operations.