California air quality regulators late Friday approved a plan to tighten limits on greenhouse gas emissions from gasoline and diesel fuels, a move expected to boost gas prices while providing public health advantages.
Members of the California Air Resources Board approved changes to the state's low-carbon fuel standard during an 11-hour meeting in Riverside that featured quite a few speakers. Twelve of the appointed board members voted in favor of the changes and two voted against. The recent standard sets lower carbon intensity limits for fuels that could be sold within the state without penalties.
The board estimates the stricter regulations will reduce asthma symptoms in greater than 70,000 Californians and drive $100 billion in private investment in clean energy infrastructure over the following twenty years. Chief Executive Liane Randolph said it will help protect residents from air pollution and climate-related natural disasters, in addition to price increases by gas firms.
“We cannot afford to continue with the status quo,” Randolph said.
But the change is controversial. The state's Republicans have denounced the board and Gov. Gavin Newsom, whose appointees dominate the board, for driving up gasoline prices, a hot-button issue across the statewhich currently has the second-highest price per gallon within the country after Hawaii, in accordance with AAA.
The vote got here amid intense political debate over inflation. Observers say that contributed to Democrats' overwhelming vote locally and nationally in Tuesday's election.
It also comes a month after a special legislative session wherein Democrats approved a plan to create a state fuel reserve. The board decides air pollution and climate policy for California, which is commonly adopted by other states. Of its 16 members, 12 were appointed by Newsom and confirmed by the state Senate. The other members are appointed by the state legislature.
Last yr, the board estimated that the proposed change could lead to a price increase of 47 cents in 2025, reaching 79 cents in 2035 as refiners pass the associated fee on to customers. Chief Executive Steven Cliff and board staff now say it's unimaginable to know whether the changes will raise gasoline prices.
Currently, the fuel standard adds about 8 cents per gallon to gasoline, said Aaron Smith, an economics professor on the University of California, Davis. He estimates that increased regulations could range from 20 to 84 cents per gallon by 2030, depending on the regulatory market.
“We don’t need lower CARB emissions – my goodness!” said California resident Melanie Arace in a public comment. “If this is just about air quality, one part of our country will not clean the air of the entire planet. Stop taxing us to death!”
Environmentalists and economists claimed at Friday's marathon meeting, where greater than 100 people addressed the board, that this system was flawed. Many were parents of youngsters with lung disease and environmental justice activists who said the usual didn’t go far enough to cut back air pollution and climate change.
Although California is prioritizing electric vehicle adoption, the lion's share of the $22 billion in private investment generated by the fuel standard largely benefited biofuel firms. This helps finance deforestation and enormous dairy farms, the critics said.
“We need clean air,” Jose Avalos, a San Bernardino resident and member of the People’s Collective for Environmental Justice, told the board. “Both you and I know that these fuels produce polluting emissions that cause more people to suffer from asthma and cancer.”
Biofuel firms, including Nebraska-based agricultural technology giant Green Plains and Brazil-based Raízen, urged the board to approve the brand new standard.
The fuel standard sets a limit on the carbon intensity of fuels. Companies that comply with the boundaries receive credits, and firms that don't – resembling oil refineries – must buy credits from people who do. Over time the limit decreases.
The recent standard lowers carbon intensity limits and increases those limits through the 2040s. The limit will increase by 10% in 2030 and fall to 90% in 2045.
The board says the usual has led to major changes within the state's fuel market – particularly the rapid adoption of renewable diesel constituted of vegetable oil. Two oil refineries within the Bay Area are currently converting to renewable diesel production.
The rapid adoption of renewable diesel led to a flood of loans, reducing incentives under this system, experts told the Bay Area News Group. That's considered one of the explanations the board lowered the usual.
Renewable diesel is taken into account lower-carbon than conventional diesel and now dominates the state's heavy-duty fuel market. However, it’s increasingly constituted of palm oil and soybean oil produced in deforested areas abroad. Global forest loss is a serious threat to biodiversity and climate change.
In response, the board is introducing “guidelines” that restrict the usage of these oils in renewable diesel produced under the usual. But the rule likely won't prevent deforestation abroad because that international market is booming, Colin Murphy, co-director of the UC Davis Low Carbon Fuel Policy Research Initiative, said in public comment.
On Thursday, the board postponed a scheduled hearing on fuel standards for gas-powered motorcycles and the primary statewide requirements for the sale of electrical motorcycles.
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