California Air Regulators Weigh Sweeping Diesel-Emission Rules .
The Associated Press,  Thursday July 26, 2007.

Sacramento - California air quality regulators were considering what would be the United States’ toughest emission standards for diesel-powered vehicles such as bulldozers and airport baggage trucks.

If adopted, the rules would force the oldest and most polluting pieces of equipment out of service and require construction firms and other companies to spend billions of dollars on new vehicles or engine retrofits.

Construction equipment and other off-road vehicles are California’s second-largest source of diesel-generated particulate pollution such as soot and ash. Trucks and buses are the biggest source.

The clean-air proposal came under immediate criticism from industry representatives, who said it asked too much of contractors and equipment retailers in too little time.

“Our industry has done nothing wrong,” said Gordon Downs, owner of Downs Equipment Rental, who estimated the rule would cost his company $2.1 million (€1.5 million) in the first year alone. “Why are we being punished by the very state we helped to build?”

  The standards before the California Air Resources Board would require emissions from backhoes, forklifts and other forms of diesel equipment to be cleaned up gradually beginning in 2010. The rules would be phased in through 2020 for fleets of large vehicles and 2025 for smaller equipment.

They are separate from the first-of-its-kind global warming law California passed last year, which requires a significant reduction of greenhouse gas emissions statewide by 2025.

More than a dozen states are asking the U.S. government for greater authority to regulate greenhouse gases, particularly automobile exhaust emissions.

    The rules being debated Thursday would be the largest crackdown on diesel emissions by California air regulators. They are intended to clean up the state’s smoggy skies by targeting nitrogen oxide and air pollutants known as particulate matter that can become embedded in lung tissue.

An estimated 180,000 vehicles would have to be retrofitted with cleaner-burning technology or replaced.

“This is one of the last sectors to get regulated,” said Andy Katz of Breathe California, a grassroots public health organization. “It’s time for the construction industry to also come forward and do their part.”

The pollutants targeted in the rule - particulate matter and nitrogen oxide - are blamed for premature deaths, respiratory ailments and cardiovascular problems. The standards under consideration are projected to prevent 4,000 premature deaths, 110,000 asthma-related cases and 9,200 cases of acute bronchitis over 20 years, according to an analysis by the air board.

Construction companies operate about half the vehicles that would be regulated. They asked the air board for an additional five years, until 2025, to have fleets of large vehicles comply with the new pollution standards.