California May Offer Option to Trump’s Emission Rule Freeze

The California Air Resources Board is mulling a formal counterproposal to the Trump administration’s plan to freeze future vehicle emission standards in 2021.

CARB Chair Mary Nichols tells Bloomberg News says the proposal would be based on details from carmakers about their emission control strategies. She says manufacturers have described Obama-era standards through 2026 as too expensive and difficult, but without explaining why.

California was granted the power to set its own emission standards by the Clean Air Act nearly 50 years ago. The state promptly imposed tougher emission rules in the 1970s than those that governed cars sold elsewhere in the U.S. The resulting dual-standard market bedeviled carmakers until the two sets of standards were brought into alignment years later.

Now California wants to implement the post-2021 standards that the White House seeks to abandon. Doing so would recreate a two-standard market, this time pitting federal rules against those of California and a dozen states that now follow its regulations.

To avoid that scenario, the White House aims to strip California of its rulemaking power. California vows a protracted legal battle, something that regulators and the auto industry are eager to avoid. Nichols says California’s goal in proposing a compromise would be to meet the Obama-era goals for curbing greenhouse gas emissions but in a way that is easier for carmakers to achieve.