California Zero Emissions Truck Updates

By Warren Hoemann, ICSA Regulatory Contributor

For well over a year, ICSA has kept its members up to date on California’s pending mandate requiring new truck purchases to be electric trucks. The California Air Resources Board (CARB) still awaits a decision from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on whether CARB may implement its Advanced Clean Fleets (ACF) rule requiring motor carriers to transition to zero emission vehicles (ZEVs) in California over the coming years. As ICSA has written, under federal law California may adopt emissions standards which differ from the federal Clean Air Act, but only if EPA grants a waiver or determines one is not necessary.

While many ICSA members operate in California, our concerns extend to a dozen other states that have adopted or are planning to adopt the California clean air standards for commercial vehicles. Meanwhile, California has made some changes both to the ACF and the Advanced Clean Trucks (ACT) rules which apply to the sale of zero emission vehicles by truck dealers.

California has withheld some enforcement. Under the ACF rule, “high priority fleets,” those with 50 or more trucks and $50 million in annual revenue, were to begin their transition to ZEVs on January 1, 2024. In an updated Enforcement Notice, CARB said that it “has decided to exercise its enforcement discretion” and not take action against high priority fleets for violations between 1/1/2024 and 90 days after the grant of an EPA waiver.

The state has modified its definition of a “high priority fleet”. Under its original posted guidance, CARB had attempted to lump independent contractors and owner-operators into the “high priority fleets” definition which meant that if 50 or more of them worked for the same broker they could all be forced to buy an electric truck. Now litigation has forced CARB to redefine “high priority fleets” as those where the vehicles are under common ownership and control.

Drayage trucks continue to operate in the ports and at railheads. The ACF rule prohibited the registration of diesel-powered drayage trucks after December 31, 2023. While the lack of an EPA waiver has allowed the continued registration of drayage trucks, a CARB Enforcement Notice says that those trucks will not be allowed to operate in California once EPA grants the waiver. In other words, diesel-powered drayage trucks registered in California after 12/31/2023 may be forced to leave the state in order to work drayage.

Part 2 - In our January Regulatory Roundup, ICSA will fill you in on how the California regulations are making it nearly impossible for OEMs and truck dealers to plan for the future of their businesses.