The Environmental Protection Agency approved California's request to enforce vehicle emissions standards stricter than federal rules, including the state's ban on sales of new gasoline-powered cars.
The EPA greenlit California's Advanced Clean Cars II rule on Wednesday, which will ban new gas vehicle sales after 2035. Under the 1970 Clean Air Act, the state must request a waiver from the EPA to set stricter auto pollution standards than the federal government.
"California has long-standing authority to request waivers from EPA to protect its residents from dangerous air pollution coming from mobile sources like cars and trucks," EPA Administrator Michael Regan said in a statement. "Today's actions follow through on EPA's commitment to partner with states to reduce emissions and act on the threat of climate change."
Republicans blasted the waiver noting how the Biden administration is fixated on forcing citizens into electric cars while like-minded environmentalists simultaneously seek to close power plants across The Golden State.
In response, House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., responded strongly saying that California should not dictate the vehicles that Americans can drive.
"By granting this waiver, the Biden EPA is further proving how out of touch it is from not only the reality of what people want, but also from what is possible. Banning gas-powered cars in favor of electric vehicles, as California intends, will raise costs for Americans and compromise our grid reliability. Just this week, NERC reported that more than half of the nation is at risk of blackouts. California has already had to ask its residents to not charge EVs during blackouts — and EVs currently make up a fraction of vehicles in the state," McMorris Rogers said in a statement, referring to the North American Electric Reliability Corporation.
The EPA's move is likely to end up in a congressional battle with the incoming administration of President-elect Donald Trump. Environmentalists are concerned Trump allies will seek to close the EPA's Washington, D.C., headquarters and relocate the agency to Texas, Florida, or another state far removed from the hermetically sealed bubble of D.C.
"The concern is that this would be a major distraction for the agency employees and also potentially force career, experienced staff to retire or to leave the agency," said Jen Duggan, executive director of the Environmental Integrity Project, adding, "which would also have an impact of the ability of the EPA to protect communities from illegal pollution."