Plaintiffs in a major case challenging the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) new heavy-duty vehicle emissions standards filed their opening brief in litigation, Fox News Digital has learned.
The new rules, finalized in March, stipulate that 40% of work trucks and 25% of semis would have to be zero emissions vehicles (ZEVs) by 2032, among other restrictions.
The American Petroleum Institute (API), a group representing 600 entities that produce and distribute the majority of U.S. energy and a prominent plaintiff in one of the suits, saw the court consolidate its filing with those from half a dozen other similar lawsuits brought by corn growers, trucking interests and a consortium of 25 states led by Nebraska.
“Americans overwhelmingly oppose the government telling them what to buy and drive, but this administration’s relentless pursuit of vehicle mandates does just that,” Ryan Meyers, vice president and general counsel for API, said.
EPA SUED OVER ‘CAPRICIOUS’ BIG-RIG EMISSIONS STANDARDS CRITICS CLAIM COULD CRIPPLE CORN INDUSTRY
Traffic on southbound Interstate 5 slows during the afternoon commute heading into downtown San Diego on June 28, 2024. (Kevin Carter/Getty Images)
“EPA’s misguided effort to force electrification of America’s trucking industry is contrary to law and threatens to disrupt the nation’s supply chain, leaving consumers in the crosshairs,” he added.”
Meyers called the mandates “unworkable” and reiterated his call for them to be rescinded.
At the same time, several entities intervened in support of the EPA, including the American Lung Association, Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, District of Columbia and Appalachian Mountain Club, according to the filing.
While the EPA has strenuously argued the new restrictions do not constitute a forthcoming “ban” on conventional big rigs, an official with the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) previously said that the aim is clearly to “phase out” diesel and bio-diesel power.
“Americans will pay dearly because of [them],” AFPM general counsel Rich Moskowitz told Fox News Digital in June.
In the new filing, plaintiffs argue that U.S. industry relies on heavy-duty vehicles that are primarily diesel powered and that “hardly any” electric big rigs are on the road right now.
“That market reality bears no resemblance to the [Biden] administration’s ambitious goal that ‘100 percent of all new … heavy-duty vehicles sold in 2040 be zero-emission vehicles” so the Administration has turned to mandates to reshape the nation’s heavy-duty fleet.”
The plaintiffs argued there is no law that permits the feds – including EPA – to mandate electric vehicles and that the agency has gone forward with its restrictions without any congressional authorization.
They went on to cite a case in which the Supreme Court sided with the State of West Virginia against the EPA in ruling the agency didn’t have the authority to regulate power plant emissions in terms of provisions from former President Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan.
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Emissions fume at the coal-fueled Oak Grove Power Plant on April 29, 2024 in Robertson County, Texas. (Brandon Bell)
A spokesperson for the National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) also offered comment at the time of the suit’s original filing, saying the EPA is trying to “impose a one-size-fits-all approach to addressing climate change by prioritizing electric vehicles over other climate remedies like corn ethanol.”
Then-NCGA President Harold Wolle, a farmer from Minnesota, argued that it might take decades to standardize electric vehicles on-the-road.
In the interim, corn-based ethanol also offers a lower-carbon fuel option and “saves consumers money at the pump while benefiting America’s rural economies,” he said.
When reached, an EPA spokesperson said the agency declined to offer formal comment or additional information, citing pending litigation.