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The transport industry has a "moral responsibility" to persuade the government of the environmental savings offered by longer semi-trailers so they can be used in the UK. That was the message from David Potter, vice president of operations for UK and Ireland at DHL Supply Chain, who was speaking at an Iveco-organised event to promote the concept of longer trailers in the UK.

The Italian manufacturer has been heavily involved in a trial of longer trailers in its home country, Progetto  Diciotto, which was officially launched in Rome last month. It has already set up a UK steering group for the project (MT 6 August), but the event at the Millbrook proving ground in Bedfordshire last week was an opportunity to give practical demonstrations of the longer vehicle.

Guests at the event were shown the turning circle and rear swing of the longer artic (using a 14.9m-long Kögel Big- MAXX trailer) compared with a unit using a standard 13.6m trailer and a drawbar outfit of 18.75m. Potter, who is part of Iveco's project, urged the industry and the government to support a new standard: "If the trailer can deliver the suggested efficiency improvement of 8%-10%, then we have a moral responsibility to make this happen."

He says DHL is already concentrating on numerous other areas, such as aerodynamics, driver training and vehicle specification, in order to cut its CO2 emissions. He adds: "If we can use longer trailers as a natural next step, we should embrace  that opportunity." Also at the event was James Hookham, MD for policy at the FTA. He says: "Anyone with a dedicated curtainsided trailer operation on pallets or roll-cages is going to be interested [in longer trailers] - essentially the whole of the food and retail supply chain."

Hookham says he is confident that as long as the industry can provide a compelling case that longer trailers will cut CO2 emissions, the government is likely to allow their use. An earlier DfT-backed study into longer heavier vehicles by Heriot-Watt University suggested that longer trailers alone could cut CO2 emissions by 45,000-60,000 tonnes per year, Hookham explains.

"I would challenge any politician to show me any single decision they could make that would cut carbon emissions by those levels," he adds.

However, a note of caution was voiced by Simon Chamberlain, MD of Crewe-based Chamberlain Transport, who also sits on Iveco's project steering group. He says he is particularly concerned that the new trailers will not be "payload neutral" (i.e. there will be no overall weight increase to compensate for the extra weight of the longer trailer). He adds: "My customers who already weigh-out aren't going to accept an 800kg reduction in payload to satisfy my other customers who want an increase in capacity. But if my customer who is cubing-out wants that extra space, then I have got to look at it.

"We have got to be very careful otherwise we will end up with a situation where we are only able to do certain loads." Chamberlain is also deputy chairman of the Transport Association and says the majority of its members share his views on the topic. For its part, Montracon, Iveco's trailer partner in the project, anticipates that a longer trailer would cost £1,000-£1,500 more than a 13.6m model.

Paul Mead, the firm's sales and marketing director, says he has been approached by snack food manufacturer Walkers Crisps about the possibility of a longer standard. He adds: "They will appeal mainly to a certain segment of road transport and it will be mainly own-account operators who derive the most value from it." He warns that general hauliers should not be bullied into giving away any extra revenue they can earn from the longer units. A DfT-sponsored study into the effects of an increase in trailer length of up to 2.05m is due to report in December.