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Resource Library / Air Pollution / Cars and Trucks

Testimony: Molly Rauch, 2021, EPA’s Revised 2023 and Later Model Year Light-Duty Vehicle Greenhouse Gas Emissions Standards

Testimony

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By: Molly Rauch, Public Health Policy Director, Moms Clean Air Force
Date: August 25, 2021
About: Environmental Protection Agency Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OAR-2021-0208
To: Environmental Protection Agency

The transportation sector is the largest source of climate pollution in the US. Cleaning up this pollution is one of the most important things we can do to fight climate change. On behalf of the more than one million members of Moms Clean Air Force, I am asking EPA to finalize the strongest possible Greenhouse Gas Emissions Standards for light duty vehicles.

Today and tomorrow, you will hear from dozens of Moms Clean Air Force staff and members, and thousands more of us will be submitting comments into the public docket on this proposal. We are here and speaking out because we see it as our primary responsibility as parents to safeguard our children’s health and future.

The latest IPCC report, released earlier this month, has affirmed that we are living in an unequivocal climate crisis. But we don’t need a UN report to tell us what so many of us are experiencing in our own communities: searing heat waves, staggering wildfires, terrible floods, unprecedented rainfall, choking drought.

This affects us all. My teenage son is an athlete who trains outside in the summer. He is playing football here in DC, and his team started daily practices last week. We have had several heat emergency days, and today is a code orange air day for ozone. We have a historical average of 11 dangerously hot days each year in DC. In this decade, we are projected to have 18 each year. By the 2050s, heat emergencies in DC are projected to increase to 30-45 days. This is hard on my son’s body now, and it will harm the health of athletes like him in the future.

At Moms Clean Air Force, we appreciate that the Biden administration is prioritizing climate action, and has pledged a 50% reduction of climate pollution from 2005 levels by 2030. Now, EPA must finalize the strongest possible standards to cut climate pollution from cars.

EPA’s proposal details several options. The “preferred” alternative includes loopholes for automakers that may undermine the pollution reduction targets. Alternative 2 is the stronger option that would reduce climate pollution faster, putting 400,000 extra electric vehicles on the road by 2026 and resulting in 130 million metric tons fewer greenhouse gas emissions, among other significant benefits, including billions in economic benefits. This is the better option, and Moms want you to go with Alternative 2.

We need 100% of new car sales to be zero-emissions by 2035. To reach that goal, the near-term standards for climate pollution must be as strong as possible, as soon as possible. Please finalize the strongest possible climate pollution limits on cars and light trucks, to help protect our children’s health and future from the climate crisis.

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