High Court Reverses Calif. Engine Mandate for Private Fleets

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of a coalition of truck and engine manufacturers seeking to overturn rules governing vehicle purchases by private fleets in Southern California, news agencies said. The rules would have required vehicles like buses, garbage and other utility trucks use the lowest emitting engines available.

The Court ruled 8-1 Wednesday that the South Coast Air Quality Management District did not have the legal right to impose rules on private fleets requiring them to purchase vehicles using the lowest-polluting engines available, the Associated Press reported. The agency applies this standard to its own fleets and had tried to expand that to all fleets public and private.

The agency, which regulates air quality in Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Riverside and Orange counties imposed the rules in 2000, AP said.

istrict spokesman Sam Atwood told AP the ruling will have little immediate effect because only a few of the vehicles currently being regulated are in private fleets.

The restrictions apply mostly to fleets of vehicles such as buses, garbage trucks, street sweepers, airport shuttles and taxi cabs, AP said. More than 5,500 clean-fuel, heavy-duty vehicles and more than 3,400 low-emission passenger vehicles have replaced old vehicles since the rules took effect.

The U.S. District Court in Los Angeles will rule on the public fleets issue. The district hopes it will allow the agency to regulate state-owned or contracted vehicles along with vehicles such as airport shuttles and taxis licensed by public agencies.

Jed Mandel told AP the court ruling was a victory for consumers and clean air. Engines mandated by the regulations were no cleaner than the diesel-burning engines they replaced, he added.

As the lone dissenting opinion, Justice David Souter said the ruling would “[prohibit] one of the most polluted regions in the United States from requiring fleet operators to buy clean engines that are readily available on the commercial market.”

Bloomberg News said the Court ordered the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles to review the public fleets portion of the rule.