15 states pledge emissions-free truck sales by 2050

Fifteen states and the city of Washington, D.C., on Tuesday announced an agreement that aims to make all new truck and bus sales emission-free by 2050. 

The effort is intended to severely curtail greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles by getting governments to require that sales within their borders be of electric trucks and buses. 

As an interim goal, those signing the memorandum of understanding would have 30 percent of new truck and bus sales in 2030 be emission free.

The memorandum is not legally binding and it says that states that don’t meet the goals won’t face any sort of disciplinary action. 

The bipartisan document was signed by the governors of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington state and the mayor of Washington D.C. 

The move follows a decision by California to require truck manufacturers to sell a greater percentage of zero-emissions trucks by 2024. 

The transportation sector makes up 28 percent of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions, the largest out of any sector, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). 

Earlier this year, the EPA unveiled its own proposal to update truck emissions regulations for the first time since 2001, however, critics fear the measure will undermine tougher state standards.