Public Hearing to Consider Proposed Advanced Clean
Fleets Regulation
Docket ID Numbers 22-14-1: Public Hearing to Consider
Proposed Advanced Clean Fleets Regulation
October 27th, 2022
My name is Ileagh
MacIvers and I am Interfaith Power & Light’s Clean Cars
Organizer. IPL’s nonprofit mission is to inspire and mobilize
people of faith and conscience to take bold and just action on
climate change.
I am here today
to speak on behalf of my organization as well as Interfaith Power
and Light affiliates in forty states that reach out to more than
22,000 congregations and millions of people of faith throughout our
nation.
I first want to
thank the Air Resources Board for creating an alternative plan to
bring electric trucks to our roads in a timely manner. Today, I am
asking the board to adopt the Advanced Clean Fleet Accelerated ZEV
Transition Alternative that will allow California to achieve 100%
electric truck sales by 2036. Electric truck technology is here and
strategies and funding are already in place to help meet these
reasonable and gradual goals.
While trucks and
buses account for a very small portion of vehicles on the road,
they create about 25% of the climate pollution we experience in
California. Heavy duty vehicles are the fastest growing source of
climate emissions and truck miles traveled are projected to grow
rapidly in the coming years. A loss of this rule, even in part,
would create major negative implications for California’s
climate goals. It would also
affect the many other states that have adopted California’s
emissions limits and zero-emission targets for heavy-duty
trucks.
We must also keep
in mind that these rules target air pollution that
disproportionately harms marginalized communities, such as
communities of color and low-income communities, living near
transportation infrastructure such as warehouses, ports and
freeways. Immediate pollution reductions are a matter of
environmental justice.
In addition, electrifying medium- and
heavy-duty trucks will be key to improving air quality and saving
lives in communities with some of the dirtiest air in the
nation. Almost every
single Californian lives in an area impacted by poor air quality.
Diesel exhaust contains more than 40 known cancer-causing organic
substances, making it responsible for about 70% of cancer risk
related to air toxins in California. It is the duty of the Air
Resources Board to protect the health of all Californians from the
detrimental impacts of air pollution.
So again, on
behalf of millions of people of faith and conscience around the
country, I urge the Air Resources Board to approve the rule in full
so California and other states across the country can reap the
benefits of heavy duty vehicle electrification and accelerate the
transition to zero emission vehicles.
Thank you for the
opportunity to testify.
Respectfully,
Ileagh
MacIvers
Clean Cars
Organizer, Interfaith Power & Light
ileagh@interfaithpowerandlight.org