Ford Sidesteps Legal Challenge to California Emissions Rules

Ford is siding with the State of California in a federal lawsuit challenging California’s decision to impose tough new emissions rules on the engines used in big trucks and industrial equipment.

“While Ford is a member of the Truck and Engine Manufacturers Assn., Ford opted out of this litigation months ago and is not involved with EMA’s legal challenge to California’s Heavy-Duty Engine and Vehicle Omnibus Regulation,” the automaker says in a statement. “We are proud to stand with California in support of clean truck emissions standards that will help accelerate the transition to zero-emissions vehicles and reduce air pollution.”

EMA’s 29 members include Ford, Honda, Daimler Truck, General Motors, Volkswagen, Caterpillar, Cummins, Navistar and PACCAR.

In a lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, the EMA seeks to ensure the California Air Resources Board (CARB) follows the requirements specified by Congress in the federal Clean Air Act that heavy-duty on-highway engine and vehicle manufacturers must be provided at least four full model years of lead time before new emissions standards currently being drafted by the EPA become effective.

On Dec. 22, 2021, CARB adopted the Heavy-Duty Engine and Vehicle Omnibus Regulation, a package of emissions standards, test procedures and related rules applicable to new heavy-duty on-highway engines and vehicles sold in California. The regulation requires compliance with the new standards by Jan. 1, 2024, providing manufacturers only two years of lead time.

In recognition of California’s unique air quality issues (pictured, below) the Clean Air Act allows the state to establish its own standards and not be subject to the Act’s preemption provisions, provided California meets certain requirements – including providing heavy-duty on-highway engine and vehicle manufacturers four full model years of lead time, EMA President Jed R. Mandel notes.

LA smog (Getty)

“Truck and engine manufacturers are proud that today’s modern engines reduce harmful emissions to near-zero levels, and we are committed to building still-cleaner products – but CARB must provide manufacturers the minimum four years of lead time mandated by Congress,” he says.

The EMA lawsuit does not challenge CARB’s or the State of California’s right to set emissions standards under the Clean Air Act, Mandel says.

“We acknowledge that the Clean Air Act gives CARB the authority to establish California-specific emissions standards and regulations,” he says. “However, in doing so, CARB must follow Congress’s requirements. This lawsuit is simply to ensure that CARB follows all of the prescribed rules – one of which is intended to maximize the likelihood of the smooth and successful implementation of new emission standards.”

California’s Clean Air Statute and the EPA waiver was negotiated in 1970 between the State of California, Republican Gov. Ronald Reagan, the Democratic Congress and Republican President Richard Nixon, a Southern California native familiar with the region’s struggle with smog and air pollution. The Clean Air Act explicitly gives California the right to set emissions standards stricter than the EPA’s.

The EMA lawsuit is separate from one filed earlier this month against the EPA by attorneys general from 17 states challenging California’s Clean Air Act waiver.

“The Act simply leaves California with a slice of its sovereign authority that Congress withdraws from every other state,” West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrissey says. “The EPA cannot selectively waive the Act’s preemption for California alone because that favoritism violates the states’ equal sovereignty.” 

Other plaintiffs in the lawsuit challenging California’s authority include the attorneys general for Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas and Utah.