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Clean Cars advocacy in other states has led to advances in hybrid technology, and put more clean cars on the road.
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A bill to adopt the Clean Cars Program has become one of the lead environmental proposals in the Maryland General Assembly
this year. Environment Maryland has been working for three years to make this bill a priority in Annapolis.
The Maryland Department of the Environment has also undertaken a review of the policy to consider adopting the program
without legislation, in response to a legal petition from Environment Maryland Research & Policy Center.
The Clean Cars Program would strengthen pollution standards for new cars and light trucks, and would limit global warming pollution
from vehicles for the first time. It would also require that advanced technology vehicles, such as hybrids, become a larger portion
of new vehicles put on the market.
The program would result in a reduction in vehicle emissions of smog-forming pollutants of 11 to 13 percent and a reduction in
cancer-causing pollution of 12 to 15 percent by 2025. Global warming pollution would be reduced by 14 percent. Eleven other states,
including Pennsylvania and New Jersey, have already adopted the program.
This policy would achieve reductions in air pollution at very little cost to state government, yield savings to individual consumers,
and have a direct positive impact on the state economy. It would marginally increase the sticker price of a new car, but that increased
cost would be more than offset by reduced fuel use. The average consumer would save $20 to $40 per month when the program is fully
implemented.
Staff at Environment Maryland Research and Policy Center have published five research reports in support of the Clean Cars Program,
including a September report about global warming emissions and a report released in December on cancer-causing emissions.
In September, we made use of a little known provision allowing individuals to petition the Maryland Department of the Environment to
take action. MDE responded to the petition, cosigned by Chesapeake Climate Action Network and Sierra Club, by announcing the review and
drafting regulatory language.
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