WASHINGTON, March 8 (BNA) – More than 80 environmental groups and other organizations are urging California Governor Gavin Newsom to impose stricter rules to promote electric cars even as the state moves faster than the administration of President Joe Biden.
“Califorians who are being penalized for high gas prices and climate disasters deserve the quickest electrification of a future Newsom government,” said Scott Hochberg of the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute, one of the groups that signed the letter.
The groups want air regulators in Newsom and California to support demand for more electric cars faster than current plans and put in place stricter annual emissions cuts for gasoline-powered vehicles. They called for annual increases of 7 percent in emissions reductions for gasoline vehicles, compared to an average of 5 percent under standards adopted under President Barack Obama, according to Reuters.
Hochberg said Newsom “needs to demonstrate the country’s climate leadership with a much faster schedule for delivering electricity.”
Newsom is scheduled to deliver his state of the state address on Tuesday. In 2020, Newsom said the state plans to phase out the sale of new light internal combustion vehicles by 2035.
California accounts for about 11% of total vehicle sales in the United States, and is the state’s largest single market, and many states are embracing green vehicle mandates.
The groups indicated that California aims to reach 61% of sales of zero-emissions electric vehicles by 2030. President Joe Biden has set a target for 50% of new vehicle sales to be electric or electric, but he has not endorsed a phase-out date Progressive sales of gasoline cars.
The letter, also signed by Greenpeace USA, the Democratic Party of California environmental grouping and Friends of the Earth, wants Newsom to consider ordering 80% or more of zero-emissions vehicles by 2030.
Newsom’s office did not immediately comment.
In April, the Environmental Protection Agency said it was moving to return statutory authority to California to set strict vehicle emissions rules and zero-emission vehicle mandates. In 2013, the Environmental Protection Agency granted California a waiver to set car rules. Under former President Donald Trump, it repealed the exemption in 2019.
EPA spokesman Nick Conger said the agency is “working to finalize a decision on the California waiver, and expects to issue a decision in the near future.”
Some automakers have raised concerns if the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) makes the waiver retroactive and the impact it could have on emissions requirements.
The Environmental Protection Agency in December finalized new rules for vehicle emissions, restoring targets that Trump has rolled back and requiring a 28.3% reduction in vehicle emissions through 2026.
Biden’s push in Congress to increase tax credits for electric vehicles to up to $12,500 per vehicle and return them to General Motors and Tesla remains stalled, along with other appropriations to boost electric vehicles.
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