Driving Climate Progress on California’s Roads: E2 Helps Secure Adoption of Groundbreaking Zero-Emission Truck Standard
Zero-emission trucks are the future, and that fact was made all the clearer recently thanks to the critical leadership of the California Air Resources Board (CARB).
E2/Environmental Entrepreneurs has a long history of elevating and amplifying the business voice to decarbonize America’s transportation system, in California and across the country, from low-carbon fuel standards to electric vehicle charging access to federal fuel efficiency standards and beyond. In fact, E2 got its start 20 years ago successfully advocating for what would eventual become California’s Advanced Clean Cars Program, a set of regulations reducing emissions from passenger vehicles that has since been replicated by 14 other states (and counting, with Nevada on its way to join that group) and served as the basis for the Obama Administration’s national Clean Car Standards.
This summer, E2 and our business leaders were proud to continue that strong tradition when — in a historic win for climate and the clean energy economy — CARB unanimously voted to adopt an ambitious Advanced Clean Trucks (ACT) rule, establishing the world’s first clean truck standard and taking a huge step forward on the state’s path to decarbonizing its medium- and heavy-duty vehicle footprint.
This groundbreaking rule requires makers of a wide range of vehicles — from heavy-duty pickups to long-haul 18-wheelers — to sell a steadily increasing number of clean, zero-emission vehicles in California in place of diesel and gasoline trucks beginning in 2024, ramping up to roughly 250,000 zero-emission trucks on the state’s roads by 2035.
This large-scale transition of California’s truck market translates to enormous reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and other harmful pollutants from California’s transportation sector, contributing to almost $9 billion in statewide health benefits over the next 20 years. It also promises to serve as a powerful boost to California’s nation-leading clean energy economy, driving innovation, investment, and job growth in the nascent clean trucking manufacturing sector and the broader business ecosystem, generating thousands of new jobs and millions in added Gross State Product.
Adoption of the ACT rule is yet another landmark climate action by California, and it wouldn’t have happened without outspoken business support, with E2 playing a central role in elevating business support. On top of a support letter we submitted to CARB signed by 268 business leaders, E2 staff also coordinated with specific business voices in the clean trucks ecosystem — clean truck manufacturers, fleet electrification solution providers, electrical drivetrain solutions suppliers, and more — and delivered testimony in support of the rule alongside representatives from these businesses.
California made real climate and clean energy progress with its adoption of the ACT rule. But there’s more work ahead to accelerate the transition of California’s trucks and its transportation sector more broadly to zero-emission. That work includes adoption of a strong complementary rule to establish requirements for the decarbonization of Californian company truck fleets that is currently pending before CARB, as well as ensuring follow through on the Memorandum of Understanding signed by California and 14 other states committing to 100 percent of new truck and bus sales to be zero-emission by 2050.
E2 will continue to bring the business voice to bear in the effort to transition our nation’s transportation sector away from harmful fossil fuels and towards zero-emission solutions. Please reach out to me at zamittay@e2.org if you want to join us in pushing for cleaner roads and a resilient and prosperous future.
