New Air Board Chairwoman Backs Clean-Car Deadline

Jacqueline E. Schafer, the new chairwoman of the state Air Resources Board, said Thursday that she supports keeping California’s electric car mandate. It was her first public comment on the issue.

Her view runs counter to the hopes of big U.S. auto makers, who want to overturn an ARB rule requiring them to make available in California zero-emissions vehicles--almost certain to be electric cars--beginning in 1998.

“I have a bias toward retaining the (zero-emissions) rule for a simple reason,” Schafer said. “It has generated the production of a whole new set of incentives (and) technology applications for transportation systems that will serve us well into the 21st Century.”

She added that the auto industry “is not a monolith” and that many entrepreneurs are working on electric car development.

Schafer said she has yet to hear the auto makers’ specific objections to the mandate but expects to as the next biennial review of the rule takes place later this year.

The Big Three U.S. auto makers contend that even the best experimental batteries are inefficient and too costly to compete with the gasoline fuel system and that they will have to raise the prices of all their cars to pay for the manufacture of electric cars.

Meanwhile, Assemblyman Bernie Richter (R-Chico) confirmed Thursday that he has drafted legislation to lift the ARB mandate. The bill, which Richter said he will introduce in the Assembly early next week, would suspend the rule until battery technology is able to meet criteria he solicited from the big U.S. auto makers.

Schafer commented on the rule during a luncheon preceding the 1994 Los Angeles Auto Show, which has a theme of “The Automobile and the Environment.” She was there to certify the first “ultra-low-emission vehicle,” a Chrysler minivan that runs on compressed natural gas. The ultra-low-emissions requirement, like the zero-emission rule, is part of the larger ARB plan for reducing air pollution from vehicles.

Gov. Pete Wilson in November named Schafer to replace Jananne Sharpless, another supporter of the mandate, which has been a target of lobbyists for the big auto manufacturers.

Chrysler Chairman Robert Eaton, in accepting the certification from Schafer, questioned whether there is a market for cleaner-burning cars. He said that while “it’s clearly in society’s interest to reduce emissions, most consumers don’t have that same interest.”