Diesel Fume Curbs Ratified Under Bush

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced Wednesday that it will proceed with plans to cut diesel exhaust from big trucks and buses by 95%, maintaining a major Clinton administration rule that environmentalists worried President Bush would try to weaken.

Shortly after taking office, Bush ordered a review of all regulations approved in the final weeks of the Clinton administration. But upon further study, EPA Administrator Christie Whitman concluded that the proposed rules are necessary to protect people from diesel soot.

“The Bush administration determined that this action not be delayed in order to protect public health and the environment,” Whitman said in a statement. The rules were considered particularly important for Los Angeles and other smoggy cities with large volumes of truck traffic.

The move marks the second time this week that environmentalists have had cause for cheer. On Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court turned back a broad industry challenge to the federal Clean Air Act and ruled that the EPA had authority to proceed with another set of rules designed to offer greater protections against soot and ozone.

“Every American will breathe easier because of this decision,” Frank O’Donnell, executive director of the Clean Air Trust, said, referring to Whitman’s announcement. “It will mean fewer asthma attacks in children, fewer cases of chronic bronchitis and other breathing problems, and fewer people dying prematurely.”

Critics in the oil and trucking industries opposed the regulations, contending that the rules rely on questionable technology and would lead to price spikes and shortages of diesel fuel. The rules would cause “uncertainty in our industry” that “could have a significant impact on the daily operations of trucking companies” and ultimately on consumers, said Walter B. McCormick Jr., president of the American Trucking Assns.

The diesel-engine regulations are designed to usher in a new generation of virtually smokeless buses and trucks, replacing the heaviest polluters on the highways.

Under the new rules, oil refiners must begin producing low-sulfur diesel fuel by 2006. That will not only reduce sulfur dioxide pollution, but enable trucks and buses to use new engines and devices that reduce soot and other smog-forming gases.

It will take about 30 years until the entire U.S. fleet of heavy-duty diesel engines switches to cleaner-running models, but the result will be a reduction of 3 million tons of air pollutants annually--equivalent to removing 13 million trucks from the nation’s highways, according to the EPA.