According to Bloomberg News, California, Oregon, New York, Massachusetts, Washington DC, and New Jersey require a significant percentage of medium to heavy-duty trucks that will be sold to fall into the category of zero-emission starting in 2025.
The trucking industry in the United States is about to witness a transformation by a few states that are planning to adopt zero-emission in-vehicle requirements. First started by California, the five other states, mentioned above are approving the rule of ACT or Advanced Clean Truck towards the end of last year.
It requires that more and more trucks that are being sold and are of medium to heavy-duty trucks must be of zero-emission the rule that will come into effect from 2025. The manufacturers must enhance their zero-emission truck sales in these states by 30 and 50 percent by 2030 and again between 40 and 75 percent by 2035.
In the forthcoming years, the mandate for new sales will fill the coastal highways and corridors of the country, with a growing number of electrically powered buses, garbage trucks, pickups, trailers, and tractors. The Heavy-Duty Omnibus rule was approved by Oregon as well. The new rule makes the tailpipe standards challenging, making will make the sale of the new trucks that still use fossil fuel 90% cleaner when implemented.
The new rules will make it compulsory for the manufacturers to build vehicles that will reduce or do away with emissions altogether, including greenhouse gas emissions and pollutants like nitrogen oxides.
Although such vehicles constitute only a small portion of the country’s fleet, the medium and heavy-duty vehicles comprise 60% or more of the vehicles that emit nitrogen oxides, which was found out as per a 2021 report, says Bloomberg News.
The prevailing low-income communities of color that are available near distribution centers and trucking corridors are not impacted uniformly by the harmful pollutant. The new rules are being banked upon to reduce the same.m
The six states taken together are trying to tune in to the new rules and the other states might follow on close heels. While Illinois, Colorado, Vermont, and Connecticut are trying to weigh on the new rules, Maine has decided to adopt the rules in 2022.
Those parts of the country that do not have the norms have undergone spillover effects as there is gradual compliance from the manufacturers as well. As part of the Clean Air Act, California is the country’s only state granted permission to develop rules related to air quality. They are even more stringent than the ones that the Federal government frames. While the other states are allowed to reproduce these strict rules, and many have standards related to the tailpipe for passenger vehicles.
