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Tell the EPA: Grant California's Full Waiver Authority for Vehicle Emissions

Fifty years ago, the Clean Air Act gave California waiver authority to set its own emissions standards for cars and trucks. Since then, every Democratic presidential administration approved California's waiver, helping reduce pollution and incentivize automakers to invest more in developing clean vehicles.

But now, the trucking industry is intervening to try to break the streak, suing the EPA to try to get the Biden administration to partially deny the waiver.

Sign an official public comment now to urge the EPA to grant California's full waiver authority for vehicle emissions. We'll submit it directly to decision-makers on your behalf!

Hello, 

I’m writing to let you know that I strongly support granting California’s full vehicle waiver authority to allow section 177 states to move forward with the Advanced Clean Trucks rule and the Omnibus Low Nox Regulations. It is important to me that the EPA protect our public health and our livable climate, and these waivers have an outsized impact on both. California has long been a leader in vehicle emissions reductions such that state and national climate targets depend on upholding California's waiver authority. Anything but fully granting this waiver authority would be incompatible with Administrator Regan and President Biden’s bold commitments to addressing climate change and environmental injustice.

Trucks are a major contributor to air pollution including nitrogen oxides, particulates, and ozone. According to a recent report from the Health Effects Institute, this traffic-related air pollution is extremely dangerous, and has been shown to contribute to early deaths from heart disease and lung cancer. 

It’s also important to note the particular effects on children, where these pollutants have been strongly linked to asthma and lower respiratory tract infections, and on communities of color. Because of red-lining and other forms of environmental racism, both historic and ongoing, communities of color are more likely to be situated near highways and trucking centers, where there is significantly more exposure to harmful air pollution. Pregnant people are also adversely affected by exposure to air pollution, which is associated with preterm birth, low birth weight, and stillbirth. 

And the harm doesn’t stop there. Transportation is the number one source of climate pollution in the U.S., and if we are going to avoid the worst impacts of the climate crisis (which include exponentially worse public health outcomes), the EPA must do everything it can to cut emissions from transportation.

States like California are preparing for an electric transportation future and are already leading the way on developing the critical infrastructure and zero-emission technology needed to get us there. The EPA should not hold them back from making progress. We need states to continue to give vehicle manufacturers and the supply chain the certainty needed to move forward with electric truck adoption. Without approving California’s vehicle waiver the five other states who have committed to more ambitious heavy duty vehicle standards will lose the opportunity to reduce pollution, which will unnecessarily prolong deadly air pollution. 

California and the EPA must protect public health and the livable climate from the proven harm of truck air pollution—in California, and in the other states that opt-in to these standards. 

I strongly urge you to grant California’s full waiver authority without delay.

Sincerely,

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