One of the great responsibilities of the California Legislature – both the Assembly and the Senate – is to guide the reactivation of the economy after the year of COVID – 19. Thus, at the same time that the jobs are reopened, it will be able to concentrate on the fight against environmental pollution and the fight for the environment.
Transportation accounts for 41 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions in California. Pollution created by vehicles – especially transportation trucks, buses, and private cars – primarily affects low-income families, immigrants, and communities of color , who generally live close to the freeways and are more exposed to emissions. The result is high rates of asthma, cancer and other similar diseases in these groups.
For the reconstruction and post-pandemic economic growth to be even and forceful, it is necessary to adopt specific measures that help to direct the electrification of the state’s automotive fleet in an efficient and especially equitable manner, so that it benefits especially low-income sectors that have frequently been left out of projects of this type.
California has been for many decades a pioneer state in the adoption of advanced technologies for the benefit of its population. Typically, it was followed by other states thanks to the size of its economy and the visionaries of its industry. The same will happen in the case of electric vehicles: here it is sold between the 45% and the 50% of the national total. This is a leading state.
Improving air quality is already a basic priority of our governments. And the tool to achieve this must be to evolve to zero-emission transport. These are large-scale investments that will represent multiple benefits for our population.
The time to make this type of decision is now and it cannot be postponed.
In the California fiscal budget for 2021 / 22, currently in the final stages of the debate, clean transport programs, the essence of which is to remove the vehicles that cause the most pollution from circulation, replacing them with zero-emission vehicles.
In January, Governor Gavin Newsom asked that $ 1, 500 be invested in trucks, clean buses and cars, as well as infrastructure to charge those vehicles.
In that sense, a coalition of environmental, environmental justice, labor, business and public health interests – the Initiative Charge Ahead California – asks state leaders to support project budgets s that provide access to clean transportation and clean air, which are only possible thanks to electric vehicles.
The coalition exists under the Charge Ahead California Initiative established in 2014 in the law SB 1275 of then State Senator Kevin De León – today Los Angeles City Councilor.
We echo his goal of that at least 50% of the electrification of transportation benefits communities with fewer resources , through the expansion of the California Clean Transportation Program.
It is crucial that any state project of this magnitude includes solving the pollution that diesel cargo trucks believe on the roads 710, 210 and others from Southern California, on their way from the Port of Los Angeles / Long Beach to national distribution centers in Imperial County. It is about cleaning those roads by removing heavy trucks , at a cost of $ 1, 400 millions. This will also provide cleaner air for farm workers in surrounding agricultural areas and in neighborhoods near both department stores and ports, in some of the most polluted areas in California.
Other funds, according to the plan, will be dedicated to transportation equity projects, such as removing school buses from circulation replacing them with electric vehicles .
Another example of these projects would be Clean Cars 4 All , a program of the California Air Resources Board that provides funding for drivers to replace their most polluting vehicles with electric vehicles, in specified areas and under certain conditions.
Unfortunately, the infrastructure of electric vehicle stations is still behind schedule. They are still very few. California has some 700, 000 electric vehicles on the road, but only a few 22, 000 charging stations. Obviously, an electric vehicle can’t travel far without a nearby charging station.
That’s why people worry about running out of battery without a place to charge. In fact, it is the main impediment to greater purchases of electric cars, now that their prices are falling.
It is estimated that to serve the five million electric vehicles that would circulate in the state in 2040, a million charging stations will be required, at the rate of one for every five cars.
These programs and others must be approved by the Legislature, in order to make possible the disposition of Governor Gavin Newsom of September 2019 , prohibiting the sale of new gasoline cars in California for 2035.
It is incumbent on California Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon and Senate President Tempore Tony Atkins to lead the fulfillment of this important goal.
Editorial of Real America News