Trucking groups cheer Trump EPA’s review of emissions rules

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Dive Brief:

• Trucking groups this week applauded the Trump administration’s plan to reconsider truck emissions rules, which the industry had argued were unachievable on existing timelines.
• The American Trucking Associations, the Truckload Carriers Association and the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association were among the groups praising the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision to reopen its greenhouse gas Phase 3 standard and review the Nitrous Oxide (NOx) rule.
• “GHG3 in its current form is unachievable given the state of battery-electric technology and the sheer lack of charging infrastructure,” ATA President Chris Spear said in a statement. “This rule has been an albatross for the trucking industry, threatening to reduce equipment availability, increase costs for businesses and consumers, and cause major supply chain disruptions.”

Dive Insight:

The stricter emissions standards, set by the Biden administration in 2022, sought to remove harmful pollutants from truck exhaust and encourage hydrogen and battery-powered electric vehicle adoption.

The GHG3 standard would have applied to trucks beginning in model-year 2027, and the NOx rule sought to curb those emissions from new trucks by up to 90% by 2031.

The Biden administration had granted waivers allowing California, which suffers from the worst air quality in the country, to set more aggressive emissions standards than EPA rules.

Under the second Trump administration, Spear said, the ATA looks forward to working with the EPA on a new national rule that “will prevent states like California from attempting to make an end run around the administration, creating a patchwork of impossible mandates that would jeopardize our economy.”

The TCA will continue to push “to ensure that emissions regulations strike a balance between environmental progress and the trucking industry’s operational realities,” the group said an emailed statement.

OOIDA President Todd Spencer said the Biden administration’s EPA rules threatened to regulate small-business truckers out of existence.

“Mom and pop trucking businesses would be suffocated by the sheer cost and operational challenges of effectively mandating zero emission trucks,” Spencer said in an emailed statement. “Vehicle reliability and affordability are top priorities for OOIDA members and we have yet to see proof that electric CMVs are a practical option for most trucking businesses considering the price tag and lack of charging infrastructure.”