A trucking company and a coalition of stakeholders are challenging California’s Heavy-Duty Low-NOx Omnibus regulation in federal court, the latest lawsuit attempting to undo the state’s stricter vehicle emission rules.
East Earl, Pa.-based H.R. Ewell, the Western States Trucking Association and several construction associations filed a petition for review of the Environmental Protection Agency’s waiver allowing California to set stricter engine emission rules. Known as the Omnibus rule, the regulation applies to engine manufacturers.
According to the Omnibus rule, model year 2024-26 on-road heavy-duty engines must lower nitrogen oxides emission by 75% below current 2010 standards and particulate matter by 50%. Adopted by the California Air Resources Board in 2021, the original rule required engines to reduce NOx levels by 90% starting with model year 2027 engines before it was amended in December 2023. In a deal with manufacturers, CARB agreed to align its NOx standards with federal EPA regulations starting with model year 2027 engines.
Without going into details, the lawsuit claims the trucking stakeholders “are adversely affected” by the heavy-duty Omnibus rule. Deadlines for briefs explaining the arguments have not been set. Plaintiffs are being represented by the Pacific Legal Foundation.
“Our Revolution was fought to throw off a faraway government – in which we had no representation – but the federal government cheated off King George’s homework when it created the Clean Air Act,” Luke Wake, an attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation, said in a statement. “Forcing businesses to submit to rules written by California bureaucrats 3,000 miles away is blatantly unconstitutional and allows the federal government to escape accountability for the fallout. We are asking the court to strike down this regulatory scheme, because California shouldn’t be enabled to create federally enforceable standards.”
Nine states have adopted California’s heavy-duty omnibus rule: Colorado, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington state.
The rule was supposed to begin in 2024 in California, but the EPA’s waiver was not finalized until this January.
This is at least the second legal challenge to the heavy-duty Omnibus rule. On the same day the waiver was finalized, the American Free Enterprise Chamber of Commerce filed a lawsuit in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. That case is still pending. American Free Enterprise also filed a lawsuit challenging Advanced Clean Fleets.
“The ability to move people and products reliably and affordably is foundational to free enterprise and a functioning marketplace that serves American consumers,” AmFree Chamber CEO Gentry Collins said in a statement. “The attempt currently underway by the State of California to ban liquid fuels and internal combustion engines is a major threat to the American way of life and terrible climate policy to boot.”
Challenges in Washington, D.C.
While the courts consider legal challenges to the heavy-duty Omnibus rule, President Donald Trump has ordered the EPA to get rid of it.
On Jan. 20, Trump signed an executive order “to eliminate the ‘electric vehicle (EV) mandate.’” That includes terminating “state emissions waivers that function to limit sales of gasoline-powered automobiles,” likely referring to California’s EPA waivers for rules like the heavy-duty Omnibus rule.
In February, the EPA sent Congress and the Government Accountability Office three waivers for review: Advanced Clean Cars II, Advanced Clean Trucks and the heavy-duty Omnibus rule. The Congressional Review Act requires agencies to submit new rules to Congress and the GAO before they can take effect. Congress then has 60 days to pass a resolution of disapproval with only a simple-majority vote, which would strike down the rule.
However, the GAO recently issued a determination that EPA waivers for CARB rules are not subject to the Congressional Review Act. Despite the finding, Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.V., said she stands with the EPA’s determination to the contrary, suggesting Republicans may move forward with Congressional Review Act resolutions anyway.
On Feb. 18, Rep. Kevin Kiley, R-Calif., announced his plans to introduce a Congressional Review Act resolution to dissolve Advanced Clean Cars II. Kiley has yet to file that resolution.
Trump’s EPA has the option of revoking the previous administration’s waivers through the regulatory process, which the president did in his first term with the Advanced Clean Cars waiver. Unlike a Congressional Review Act resolution, which requires legislation signed into law to undo, an agency rule can be more easily reversed by a future administration.
On Wednesday, March 12, the EPA issued 31 deregulatory actions. LL
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