AFVs in U.S. May Benefit from EPA’s Proposed Cleaner
Air Standards
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recently
proposed tightening the nation’s ozone and particulate standards, a
step which may provide a boon to the alternative fuel vehicles (AFV) industry.
The new clean air standard will pressure vehicle fleets to convert from
diesel fuel (one of the major sources of particulate pollution) to cleaner
fuels.
Under EPA’s proposal, the new lower-ozone
standard (falling from 0.12 parts per million for ozone measured over one
hour to 0.8 ppm as measured over an eight-hour period) would take effect
by the year 2000. The new particulate standards—which would limit fine
particulates 2.5 microns in diameter and smaller—would take effect
in 2002.
The EPA says the tighter air pollution standards
will protect 133 million Americans from serious respiratory problems caused
by dirty air, and cites 86 health studies indicting particulates as a major
health threat even at today’s existing standard.
Although the EPA is behind the proposed air
quality standard, the actual regulations will be determined at state, city,
and local levels. The agency estimates that its proposed standards will
triple the number of counties in the U.S. designated as having dirty air,
from 106 counties now to at least 335. (Others have projected that the number
of newly affected counties could be as high as 507.)
Opportunity Knocks for AFVs
The increase in the number of local areas drawn
into EPA’s State Implementation Plan process could provide an opportunity
for the AFV industry. Any pollution reductions made in suburban and rural
areas newly impacted by the proposed standards will be counted as clean
air progress for the entire region. Local regulators may look to these more
remote regions for ozone and particulate reductions to increase compliance
for their own area.
And that spells opportunity for AFV conversions.
A rural city’s fleet of buses or garbage trucks or a private company’s
diesel-powered delivery fleet could switch to alternative fuels and help
an inner city’s overall air quality picture, says an EPA spokesman.
However, economic incentives for fleets to switch
to compressed natural gas, electricity, or propane will probably have to
be provided by the AFV industry. “It’s unlikely that regulators
will even consider direct mandates to force private, city, or state fleets
to make a switch from diesel fuel,” reports Fleets & Fuels.
“The AFV industry will instead have to lobby state and national governments
for economic incentives to indirectly subsidize fleet conversions.”
Such an incentive is expected to be submitted
to Congress this year. A bill introduced by Senator Joe Barton (R-Texas)
will offer a mix of tax credits and breaks, better depreciation rates, and
sales tax relief to make conversions to natural gas more attractive.
Yet these incentives may not be enough to win
fleet managers over to alternative fuels; the lack of a refueling infrastructure
remains the major problem. Although some large, centrally fueled operations,
such as city bus fleets, can create their own refueling infrastructure,
independent truckers are predicted to reject conversions until refueling
is more convenient.
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