Free Republic

The Biden administration could allow California to implement a rule designed to push green locomotives, but a growing list of stakeholders are warning that the regulation would severely impact the state’s economy and the national rail industry. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) could soon determine whether it will allow the California Air Resources Board (CARB) to move forward with a state regulation that would ban the use of locomotives that are more than 23 years past their manufacturing date unless they run using zero-emissions technology, according to Progressive Railroading. The rule could disrupt supply chains and saddle the state’s railway...

Coast Guard will not enforce new California rule, citing 'safety concerns' The Center Square) - The U.S. Coast Guard says it “will not enforce” a new California Air Resources Board regulation, citing “safety concerns.” The Coast Guard and business organizations oppose CARB's requirement that commercial harbor craft install diesel particulate filters linked to a number of fires. Seventeen states are suing the Environmental Protection Agency for giving an exemption to California alone to enact its own air standards that, by power of its market size, govern much of the rest of the country.

The final rule in a set of regulations adopted 15 years ago takes effect this week, banning some 70,000 big rigs from California roads. A set of clean air regulations implemented by the California Air Resources Board (CARB) in 2008, and later signed into law as Senate Bill 1, states that any diesel vehicles weighing over 14,000 pounds and built before 2010 are banned from operating on California roads as of Jan. 1, 2023.

As California expands its efforts to phase out natural-gas use in homes, the nation’s largest gas utility is trying to reinvent itself for a future in which far fewer customers use its core service. Southern California Gas Co., a unit of Sempra, is studying how to repurpose its system—and handle the costs of doing so—as the state works to ban the sale of gas furnaces and water heaters starting in 2030. The state’s initiatives are the latest in a series of measures aimed at reducing future gas use to address climate-change concerns. Already, about 50 California cities and towns have...

Members of California’s Air Resources Board today questioned the practicalities of their staff’s proposal to ban gas-powered vehicles, raising concerns over challenges in buying and charging electric cars.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration is restoring California’s authority to set its own tailpipe pollution standards for cars, reversing a Trump administration policy and likely ushering in stricter emissions standards for new passenger vehicles nationwide. A waiver approved Wednesday by the Environmental Protection Agency allows California to set tough emissions rules for cars and SUVs and impose mandates for so-called zero-emission vehicles that do not contribute to global warming. Former President Donald Trump’s 2019 decision to revoke California’s authority to set its own limits on auto emissions was one of his most high-profile actions to roll back environmental rules...

Hundreds of requests for details on the specifics of the container shipping backlog. So, I spent 3 days calling sources, digging for details and gathering information on the substantive issue at hand. The epicenter of the problem is not what is being outlined by financial media, corporate media and politicians who have a specific interest in distracting from the issues at hand. This has nothing to do with COVID-19. The issues being discussed today relate to events that happened a long time ago. As a matter of fact, it was so predictable that Amazon, Walmart, UPS, FedEx, Samsung, The Home...

CARB says there are 16.7 million small engines in the state compared to 13.7 million passenger vehicles, drastically affecting emissions.California Governor Gavin Newsom has signed legislation that aims to ban the sale of gas-powered lawn equipment, generators, and other small engines designed for off-road use.This new law builds from the executive order signed by Newsom in 2020 that bans the sale of new passenger cars powered by internal combustion engines in 2035. In the same order, Newsom calls for "100 percent zero-emission off-road vehicles and equipment," the phaseout of which must now be road mapped by the California Air Resources...

We’re in crab season, here in Maryland. Some versions of Crab Imperial can be totally ‘keto friendly’, and here is one, from the long-time Maryland seafood company and restaurant ‘Phillips': http://www.phillipsfoods.com/recipes/classic-crab-imperialCrab Imperial 1 lb. Phillips Jumbo Lump Crab Meat 1 tsp. parsley 1 tsp. fresh lemon juice 1 egg 1 tsp. Phillips Seafood Seasoning 1 tsp. Worcestershire sauce 3 oz. Hellmann’s mayonnaise 1 tsp. melted butter Imperial Topping: 3 oz. Hellmann’s mayonnaise 1 oz. half & half 1/2 tsp. Phillips Seafood Seasoning 1/2 tsp. fresh lemon juice 1/2 tsp. Worcestershire Sauce Pinch of paprika 1/4 c. shredded Cheddar cheese 4...

The next frontier in California’s battle against pollution: lawn equipment. State air regulators are laying long-term plans to phase out gasoline-powered devices like leaf blowers and lawn mowers, saying they can produce more noxious emissions than cars. Plenty of Bay Area cities are already acting: At least eight have banned gas-powered blowers, and more restrict their use during times of day or up to a certain noise level. Novato may soon join the list. “What I think we need to realize is that we have to do something different for climate change in the world,” said Novato Mayor Pro Tem...

Hospitals feed cancer patients sugar and high carbohydrate diets for a simple reason: they are abysmally ignorant of the role of nutrition in health and disease — hence their burgeoning growth, packed rooms, and ‘return customers.’ Even though the science itself shows – at least since the mid-20’s with Otto Warburg’s cancer hypothesis — that tumors prefer to utilize sugar fermentation to produce energy rather than the much more efficient oxygen-based phosphorylation* – hospitals have actually invited corporations like McDonald’s to move into their facilities to ‘enhance’ their patient’s gustatory experience, presumably to provide comfort and take the edge off...

... Loath to let a natural disaster go to political waste, the California Air Resources Board used the fires to promote a new climate-change “scoping plan” aimed at doubling the rate at which it cuts carbon emissions. The irony is that the emissions from wildfires could negate all of the state’s anticarbon policies. A 2007 study in the journal Carbon Balance and Management found that California’s wildfires in 2003, which burned more than 750,000 acres, produced the monthly carbon equivalent of about half of the state’s fossil-fuel burning sources. Ditto the state’s September 2006 wildfires. On average the state’s annual...

espite a California Construction Trucking Association lawsuit attempting to halt the regulations, the CARB brought in big federal guns The metastasis of statewide diesel truck regulations created by the California Air Resources Board has forced many large and small truckers out of business. The truckers still in business have had to spend $20,000 to $50,000 per truck retrofit with the CARB’s expensive, mandated Diesel Particulate Filter, or they have had to buy newer model trucks to meet the new regulations. New trucks are hugely expensive. By the stroke of a pen from unelected career bureaucrats hiding behind layers of government,...

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Private firms looking to build California's $68 billion high-speed train system have concerns about the state's ability to finance some of the project's cost through an untested 'cap-and-trade' carbon trading levy. The doubts, mentioned in correspondence to the state and reviewed by Reuters through a public records request, are not likely to stall financing for the United States' largest infrastructure project, but indicate a tentativeness among firms to use the money as a stand-alone money-generating tool. The California High-Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA) expects to raise $500 million per year for the rail line from the cap-and-trade...

Shares in Volkswagen (VLKAF) crashed 20% Monday, wiping 16 billion euros ($18 billion) off the company's value after it was found to have misled U.S. regulators. Federal and state regulators said Friday that the German company cheated on environmental standards by programming some diesel-fueled cars to turn on emission controls only when being tested. Volkswagen, recently crowned the world's biggest carmaker by sales, also owns the Audi and Porsche brands. The software is installed in nearly 500,000 cars on U.S. roads, including some of its luxury-brand Audi cars. Regulators have ordered Volkswagen to recall the vehicles. The company said it...

The Obama administration on Friday directed Volkswagen to recall nearly a half-million cars, saying the automaker illegally installed software in its diesel-power cars to evade standards for reducing smog. The Environmental Protection Agency accused the German automaker of using software to detect when the car is undergoing its periodic state emissions testing. Only during such tests are the cars’ full emissions control systems turned on. During normal driving situations, the controls are turned off, allowing the cars to spew as much as 40 times as much pollution as allowed under the Clean Air Act, the E.P.A. said. “We expected better...

Germany’s VW AG has a mixed situation in the US – on one hand its luxury stablemate Audi is thriving and posting record sales each month, while on the other hand the mass-market brand is suffering. The company is a powerhouse in Europe, where it’s the largest automaker and thanks to China has also achieved the status of the second biggest carmaker in the world. Among the issues lie the fact that in the US the mass-market car brand VW has been sliding while the rest of the market is going up and the fact that Audi is indeed posting...

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and California officials say some 482,000 Volkswagen and Audi diesels were engineered to falsify their emissions for federal tests—a violation that opens the German automaker to a theoretical fine totaling $18 billion. The EPA and California Air Resources Board say the affected models had software in its computer engine controls that could sense exactly when it was being tested for emissions quality. At all other times, it would run the diesels in a different mode with illegal levels of pollution; for example, spewing up to 40 times more nitrogen oxide, a key component of smog,...

Take notice if you drive to and from work each day in California. SB 350, known as the California Gas Restriction Act of 2015, (de León) requires a 50% reduction in petroleum, 50% increase in renewables for electricity generation, and a 50% increase in the energy efficiency of buildings by 2030. SB 350 will also grant the Air Resources Board significant authority to adopt regulations that will result in a 50% reduction in petroleum use in cars and trucks by 2030. In short, unelected regulators will be able to limit how far you can drive, ration gas, increase costs, and...

The most powerful woman in California isn’t a celebrity, she’s not even someone you often see on TV. That’s because the most powerful woman in California is Mary Nichols, head of the state’s Air Resources Board. Rules set by Nichols’ agency are among the strictest environmental laws in the nation. Nichols’ goal is for every new car sold in California by the year 2030 to be zero- or almost-zero-emissions, a quest which is taking a toll on automakers selling these efficient vehicles. September will be the biggest test for the 70-year-old Nichols’ grand plans. That’s when her mandate of having...