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Mar 27, 2008 11:31 am US/Pacific
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California May Pull Plug On Electric Cars
SACRAMENTO (AP) ―
California air regulators on Thursday began considering a major revision to the state's auto emissions program, cutting the number of battery-powered and hydrogen vehicles that automakers must produce for California and 12 other states.
Auto manufacturers say they need more time, but the proposal before the California Air Resources Board has drawn criticism from environmentalists, health advocates and some leading political figures. They question whether the state can afford to relax the rules on automakers in the era of global warming.
"Our goal here today is to emerge with a whole new direction that will get this program on track," air board chairwoman Mary Nichols said. "Our goal is to have California's vehicle program to be the testbed and California be the state where manufacturers first bring their best, cleanest technology."
California adopted its zero-emission vehicle mandate in 1990. The rule required that 10 percent of new cars sold in the state by the country's six major auto manufacturers be completely nonpolluting by 2003.
Twelve other states -- Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Mexico, New York, New Jersey, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington -- adopted the California standard.
At the time, California's mandate was the most aggressive program in the nation requiring zero-emission vehicles, or ones that do not produce smog-forming emissions such as nitrogen oxide.
The rules have been modified four times since they were introduced. The biggest change came in 2003, when the Air Resources Board ruled that hydrogen cars, hybrids and cleaner-burning gasoline vehicles could meet the state's zero-emission mandate.
The regulators were concerned that battery-powered cars could not be mass-produced, and they were facing a lawsuit from the auto industry.
The program has not yet produced results. The main automakers still do not have a commercial zero-emission vehicle.
The 2003 rules set a goal of putting 25,000 of those cars on the road by 2014. The recommendation before the Air Resources Board on Thursday would further reduce the number of hydrogen fuel cell or battery-powered vehicles automakers are required to put on the road in California between 2012 and 2014.
Instead of producing 25,000 vehicles, General Motors Corp., Toyota Motor Corp., Ford Motor Co., Honda Motor Co., Chrysler LLC and Nissan Motor Co. would have to build 2,500 for use in California. That number could be raised, however, when the board meets.
"I think that rollback is more extreme than what the board would go for," Nichols said in an earlier interview. She described the previous board's action in 2003 as a mistake.
To offset the lower mandate on zero-emission vehicles, the air board's staff proposes that automakers instead put 75,000 gas-electric hybrids on the road between 2012 and 2014. It also would require automakers to continue making more fuel-efficient gasoline vehicles.
That shift would satisfy the air quality goals of the program and save auto manufacturers $1.3 billion a year while they explore new technology, according to a report by the Air Resources Board staff.
General Motors spokesman Dave Barthmuss said automakers are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to build one fuel-cell vehicle or battery-powered car. Such a vehicle would cost far more than the average American can afford, he said.
GM also has spent about $10 million on hydrogen fueling stations because not enough of them have been built to support the vehicles regulators are demanding.
Environmental groups and health advocates also are lobbying the Air Resources Board to expand the zero-emission vehicle program as part of the targets California must meet under its 2006 law to reduce overall levels of greenhouse gas emissions.
Converting California's entire automobile fleet to zero-emission vehicles would prevent an estimated 300 premature deaths and help those who suffer from asthma, Bonnie Holmes-Gen, policy director of the American Lung Association of California, said Thursday.
"Zero-emission vehicles do save lives, reduce illnesses and hospitalizations," she said. "California is falling far behind in meeting our state and federal air quality goals. Over 90 percent of Californians are breathing unhealthy air."
(© 2008 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)