Two bills signed into law last week by California Gov. Gavin Newsom will further crack down on heavy-duty diesel trucks in the state. One law establishes “smog checks” for trucks to register and/or operate in the state, while the other is designed to accelerate the move away from diesel-powered trucks to zero emissions vehicles — with the latter pressing the state to phase-out diesel-powered trucks by 2050.
The smog check law establishes a so-called Heavy-Duty Vehicle Inspections and Maintenance Program to test the effectiveness of the control of emissions and oxides of nitrogen (NOx) and particulate matter. The new law allows for the use of onboard diagnostics system data and test procedures to measure emissions control effectiveness.
“Just as car owners have to get their own personal cars ‘smog checked’ every two years, so too should truck operators be required to maintain their emissions controls so that we can ensure long lasting air quality improvements here in California,” said California Sen. Connie Leyva, who sponsored the legislation.
The new testing will be more in-depth than the current Periodic Smoke Inspection Program (PSIP) tests the state conducts, which measure smoke opacity levels in trucks owned by California-based fleets with two or more trucks. The new law calls for the California Air Resources Board to sunset the PSIP once the new program is fully implemented. It will also apply to all diesel trucks weighing more than 14,000 pounds, including single-vehicle fleets.
Joe Rajkovacz, director of government affairs and communications for the Western States Trucking Association, says WSTA is opposed to the emissions testing bill “because [CARB] had already moved toward reducing opacity limits, and we weren’t objecting to that. This is not only redundant, but also costly.”
Another point of concern in the law, says Rajkovacz, is giving emissions testers access to engine control module data. He says CARB has said it only wants emissions data from the ECM, but there is “certainly a lot of other data with it.”
Under the new law, CARB is tasked with implementing a pilot program to develop and test technologies to bring heavy-duty vehicles into the new inspection and maintenance program. Within two years after the completion of the pilot program, the program would be fully implemented.
