Climate Policy Engagement Analysis
Climate Policy Engagement Overview: The Truck and Engine Manufacturers Association (EMA) has negatively engaged with GHG emissions standards and ZEV sales mandates in the US in 2022-2024. The EMA has advocated to weaken federal GHG emissions standards for heavy-duty vehicles, and previously opposed the state-level Advanced Clean Trucks rule before signing the Clean Trucks Partnership.
Top-line Messaging on Climate Policy: InfluenceMap has not found evidence of top-line communications on climate from the EMA and it does not appear to explicitly support the Paris Agreement.
Engagement with Climate-Related Regulations: The Truck and Engine Manufacturers Association (EMA) advocated to delay and weaken the EPA’s Phase 3 GHG emissions standards for heavy-duty vehicles and opposed EPA’s proposal to re-open and increase the stringency of existing Phase 2 regulations for heavy-duty trucks in June 2023 regulatory comments and May 2023 testimony. EMA President Jed Mandel appeared unsupportive of the Phase 3 GHG emissions standards in an April 2024 statement appearing in Logistics Management, suggesting that the policy was infeasible due to a lack of charging infrastructure. NPR in April 2024 also reported that Mandel had described the Phase 3 rule as “the most challenging, costly and potentially disruptive heavy-duty emissions rule in history” In October 2023 regulatory comments the EMA also advocated for the transport sector to remain outside the scope of EPA’s greenhouse gas reporting rule.
Positioning on Energy Transition: The Truck and Engine Manufacturers Association has mostly negative engagement with US climate polices to decarbonize heavy-duty transport in 2022-2024, while supporting government incentives and tax credits for new zero-emission vehicles.
Despite previously opposing the Advanced Clean Trucks (ACT) policy in multiple states, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) and EMA announced the Clean Trucks Partnership in July 2023, an agreement in which the EMA and certain truck manufacturers would not oppose the adoption of CARB’s rules at the state level and would voluntarily meet the targets set by the Advanced Clean Truck rule. Since adopting the agreement, the EMA advocated for changes to the adoption of the Advanced Clean Trucks policy that could weaken the rule, and has expressed significant concerns with feasibility of adoption. In October 2024 comments on the adoption of ACT in Illinois, the EMA appeared unsupportive of the rule. In August 2023 the EMA emphasized significant concerns with a lack of infrastructure and advocated for a credit pooling program with unclear impacts on the policy in August 2023 comments on New Mexico, Maine, Rhode Island, and Connecticut’s adoption of ACT.
Before adopting the Clean Trucks Partnership in July 2023, the EMA lodged objections to multiple US states considering adopting California’s Advanced Clean Trucks Rule in 2022. This includes opposing the adoption of the rule in a consultation response in Colorado in April 2022 (found via FOIA request) as part of the “Partners for a Zero Emission Vehicle Future” coalition, in Massachusetts' adoption in February and March 2022 consultation responses, both also found via FOIA requests. The EMA also broadly opposed the ACT rule in April 2022 public comments from the PZEVF coalition to the Clean Air Association of the Northeast States. The EMA also previously advocated for EPA to delay granting CARB a waiver of preemption for the Advanced Clean Trucks policy in August 2022 regulatory comments. In March 2023, the EMA again opposed the issuance of a pre-emption waiver to California in a consultation response, an action which was reported by Politico in March 2023 to have delayed the adoption of the NOX omnibus, Advanced Clean Trucks, and Advanced Clean Fleet rules in California. The EMA also opposed CARBs proposal to replace the ACT policy with a 100% ZEV sales mandate in 2036 in April 2023 comments.
In an April 2023 consultation response, EMA strongly opposed a proposal to bring forward a 100% ZEV sales mandate from 2040 to 2036 under California’s Advanced Clean Fleets (ACF) regulation. Similarly, in an October 2022 consultation response, EMA appeared unsupportive of the ACF rule’s initial proposal of a 2040 100% ZEV sales mandate.
Regarding heavy-duty vehicle charging infrastructure and purchase incentives, EMA president Jed Mandel supported funding to decarbonize HDV infrastructure in an October 2023 letter to US Senate leaders. The EMA also strongly supported the Powering Up Californians Act, a bill to accelerate the deployment of electric infrastructure in California, in an October 2023 joint letter. In a June 2022 press release the EMA advocated for purchasing incentives and charging infrastructure for zero-emission trucks, and in an April 2023 press release EMA’s President called for a Phase 3 GHG emissions rule to include significant investment for electric and hydrogen refueling infrastructure. The association more negatively opposed specific clean hydrogen production measures in a February 2024 joint statement on the 45V Credit for Production of Clean Hydrogen.