Unless you're in the trucking industry, Con-way Inc. is likely to be one of those big companies you've heard very little about.

The $5 billion firm is a major player in the freight transportation business and had an important role in the development of the Obama administration's landmark fuel efficiency and greenhouse gas emissions standards for heavy duty trucks (and other large vehicles that haul things or people).

Heavy-duty trucks are the workhorses of commerce, they are integral to the supply chain of every business, and the movement to reduce their impact on the environment is huge.

Con-way joined truck and engine manufacturers, transport firms, scientists and a gaggle of sustainability-focused NGOs in helping the government craft the new regulations. They're expected to save companies as much as $50 billion in fuel costs, cut oil consumption by 530 million barrels and save the planet from 270 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions.

Engaging in the effort was an extension of the company's long track record to boost the performance as well as the fuel and cost efficiency of trucks, said Randy Mullett, Con-way's vice president for government relations.

From route management and logistics to operations and vehicle design, Con-way has developed solutions that have improved the way the company does business and bolstered its bottom line. Those improvements have also helped the firm reduce its environmental impacts. And as an EPA SmartWay partner almost since the program's inception, Con-way has joined others in the industry to push practices and strategies that reduce emissions.

A follower of Lean Six Sigma management principles, Con-way's work on sustainability issues is an outgrowth of a business imperative: the need to use energy -- namely fuel -- efficiently.

But that's not something Con-way talks about much outside its circle of industry partners. I caught up with Mullett recently to ask why and to see if he would detail some of Con-way's efforts.

He covered a lot of territory in our conversation. Here is his answer to the first question and a summary of what Con-way is doing to shrink its environmental tireprint:

Is Con-way really a quiet company when it comes to sustainability, or were we just not listening?

"We have been very careful to not get out in front of our sustainability initiatives in a way that could be construed as greenwashing. Sustainability is a fast emerging, quickly changing area. We're involved in an industry that uses a lot of energy, and our goal has always been to use that as efficiently as possible. Our leadership had a tough time convincing itself that that was really sustainability as it is being portrayed in the public space by people who like to talk a lot about sustainability.

"A lot of the things we've done have been rather low-tech solutions. Things like turning the speed governors back on the fleet resulted in tremendous savings of both fuel usage and, therefore, greenhouse gas reduction, as well as expense for the company. But we've been very careful to make sure we were erring on the side of conservatism when we were making those claims ... [So] even though the company has traditionally been quiet, we do have a list of things that we're working on that can take us down the sustainability path."

Getting Traction from Low-Tech Solutions

In 2008, Con-way changed the settings for the speed governors on the fleets for its less-than-truckload and full truckload transport businesses. The maximum speed for the Con-way Freight fleet, which consolidates less-than-truckload deliveries, went from 65 mph to 62 mph. The maximum speed possible for the fleet of Con-way Truckload dropped to 65 mph from 70 mph.

"In other words, when the truck hits 65 miles per hour, it just won't go any faster -- it doesn't matter how hard you press on the accelerator," Mullett said. "That simple change [in both fleets] reduced our fuel usage by over 6 million gallons per year."

Next page: Using Design and Innovation to Improve Fuel Efficiency