Palmetto State News

(COLUMBIA, S.C.) - Attorney General Alan Wilson has joined a coalition of 19 states challenging the Environmental Protection Agency’s (“EPA”) decision to allow California to illegally ban tractor-trailers and heavy-duty vehicles by forcing truckers to buy zero-emission trucks and mandating net-zero emissions standards, which would regulate trucking out of existence.

“If you think prices have been bad during the Biden Administration because of inflation, imagine how crippling they’ll be if this illegal truck ban is allowed to stand,” Attorney General Wilson said. “There were more than 13 million trucks on U.S. roads in 2020, carrying the goods we all buy. Either we won’t be able to get the things we need, or the cost of those goods will be astronomical. This ban is another example of prioritizing the climate change agenda above everyday people.”

The Biden Administration gave California authority to force most buses, vans, trucks, and tractor-trailers to be zero emission by 2035. The ban is part of the Biden Administration’s aggressive climate change agenda, which hikes prices for businesses and consumers. Costs for electric trucks already start at about $100,000 and can reach the high six figures. California’s new regulations are setting the standard for the rest of the country. Eight other states have already adopted California’s truck ban, and more are considering it. But California’s Advanced Clean Trucks regulation is in violation of the Clean Air Act and other federal laws. 

California’s truck ban will not only increase costs, but it will devastate the demand for liquid fuels, such as biodiesel, and cut trucking jobs across the nation. Almost 80% of South Carolina communities depend exclusively on trucks to move their goods, and there are almost 8,000 trucking companies in South Carolina, most of them small, family-owned businesses. 

Currently, just 2% of heavy trucks sold in the United States are electric.  

Iowa led the lawsuit joined by Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

Read the full petition for review here.

Original source can be found here