Passionate testimony both for and against was given Thursday at a Department of Environmental Protection hearing on the state’s Advanced Clean Cars Program.
Ray Cantor, deputy chief government affairs officer for the New Jersey Business and Industry Association, said, “We don’t believe that gas-powered cars should be prohibited to be sold in New Jersey. We think there are a lot of problems with this proposal. The cars are not affordable. We don’t have the infrastructure to deal with it. … And we don’t think the state should be mandating them.”
“Cars and light trucks are the largest source of ground-level ozone. So, a majority of New Jersey counties fail on ozone standards…,” said Doug O’Malley, the director of Environment New Jersey. “We expect because of climate change that our ozone standards are going to double over the course of the next three decades. So, we really need to tackle our pollution from our carbon trucks, both for climate change and our lungs.”
“It is wrong for any institution any trade organization to contribute to mis- and disinformation that mislead people,” said Shawn LaTourette, the commissioner of the DEP. “There is no ban on gasoline-powered cars by the Murphy administration. There is a ramp-up to get us to an all zero-emission vehicle future. And that plan does not mean that no one in the state of New Jersey could ever buy a gas-powered vehicle after 2035. It means that auto makers should contribute more electric vehicles to our marketplace. It does not constrain choice. It opens choice. It is following the market.”
According to the DEP’s latest strategic climate action plan, New Jersey will need 4.5 million electric vehicles by 2035 to meet its goal of phasing out gas-powered cars.
