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California environmental regulators have approved a new standard that will require a 10% reduction in the carbon content of transportation fuels by 2020 and encourage a transition to nonpetroleum-based fuels.

Oil closed the trading day Wednesday near $51 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange following an Energy Department report that showed gasoline inventories declined last week, Bloomberg reported.

The California Air Resources Board has adopted a low-carbon fuel regulation that targets cutting greenhouse gas emissions from the state’s transportation fuels by 10% by the year 2020.

Navistar International Corp. said Monday that it has received total hybrid vehicle certification from the California Air Resources Board, becoming the first truck and bus manufacturer to do so.

A trio of Obama administration cabinet-level officials last week rejected claims that the carbon emissions cap-and-trade bill would result in massive U.S. job losses and large increases in consumer utility and fuel bills.

Lower fuel prices, along with the assistance of some forgiving financiers, limited the number of first-quarter trucking bankruptcies to 480, slightly more than in the last three months of 2008, but far below the 935 firms that failed in the corresponding period a year ago.

Legislation introduced by two prominent members of the Senate Finance Committee could go a long way toward taking the air out of some politicians’ stampede to raise short-term revenue by leasing out or selling public highways and other public assets.

Forward Air Corp. said it lost $3.1 million, or 11 cents per share, compared with a profit of $10 million, or 35 cents, a year ago.