The Environmental Protection Agency recently released the first part of its “Clean Trucks Plan,” a proposed rule that would establish tighter standards on various emissions produced by heavy-duty vehicles beginning with model year 2027. In a new insight, Senior Regulatory Policy Analyst Dan Goldbeck assesses the proposal’s impacts, notes its status as the most costly rulemaking of 2022 to-date, and suggests it portends even more expansive regulatory activity coming soon.

Key points:

• While EPA’s proposal does include modest adjustments to greenhouse gas emissions standards, the regulatory proposal remains primarily focused on “criteria pollutants,” such as nitrous oxide, ozone, and particulate matter instead of climate policy.
• The proposed rule provides a wide range of potential cost and benefits estimates, but with cost estimates pushing $30 billion, this action would be the most economically significant rulemaking thus far in 2022.
• The proposed rule suggests the return of a decidedly more assertive EPA; it is apparently only the first step in a broader regulatory plan for heavy-duty vehicles.

Read the analysis