Phil Ting, a Democrat out of San Francisco and a California Assembly member, has just introduced a bill to ban the sale of fossil fuel cars in California starting from 2040. If the Clean Cars 2040 bill is accepted, it would require all new passenger vehicle registrations to be zero-emissions.
The bill will be in effect from January 1, 2040. It does not apply to commercial vehicles over 10,000 lbs and it allows the existing fossil fuel cars to stay on the road. It also allows people moving into Californa registering their pre-owned fossil fuel cars with California plates.
This is not a surprising move as it brings the United States in line with the plans that other regions like China and the European Union have already announced. All of them are planning to ban combustion engine sales for passenger vehicles around 2030 to 2040. UK even has plans to get all such existing cars off the roads by 2050.
The reason these plans are not going into effect immediately and have decades of lead time is because this is a huge challenge for the automotive industry. It would require new technology and a great amount of change in the infrastructure. However, this is a good step and more importantly a necessary one if we wish to save our planet.
So fingers crossed for this new bill!