President Trump plans to revoke a rule that allowed California to set tougher car pollution standards than those already in place federally. It is likely that this will end up being a drawn out court battle between California and the US Environmental Protection Agency.
Revoking the rule has been in the works for nearly three years now, and it would remove the authority that has allowed California to be an environmental leader in terms of greenhouse gases and air quality. By revoking this special waiver, the administration is laying out that no state can have stricter pollution controls than what are already in place by the federal government.
The removal of the waiver would not only affects California, but thirteen other states as well that also have more strict emission standards than those imposed by the federal government. These other states have vowed to join the battle in fighting the removal of the waiver.
The priority to finalization of the rule change comes three months after California secretly negotiated a contract with four major automobile companies three months ago including BMW, Ford, Honda and Volkswagen. As part of their pact, these companies voluntarily agreed to increase fuel efficiency and reduce emissions, ignoring the Trump administration’s rollback on car pollution standards.
Only adding fuel to the fire is a Department of Justice antitrust investigation looking into whether these automakers violated federal competition laws by reaching an incentivized agreement with California to reduce emissions. The EPA and Department of Transport also warned the state of “legal consequences” if they do not exit the agreement.
While the rollback has been continually delayed, it is not clear whether or not the administration will be able to execute it. However, experts think that the removal of the rule wouldn’t necessarily prevent automakers from lowering emissions, in fact, it may force automakers to lower there standards more than what was already agreed upon.
