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Trump administration revokes California's stricter emission standards

Posted at 1:41 AM, Sep 20, 2019
and last updated 2019-09-20 14:13:45-04

The Trump administration officially revoked California's ability to set its own emission standards.

California previously set stricter standards thanks to the 1970 Clean Air Act, the federal legislation aimed at fighting air pollution nationwide.

The rollback by the Trump Administration means the government will have one set of nationwide fuel economy and greenhouse gas emission standards for cars and light-duty trucks.

Sunset Honda sales manager David Idell believes that regardless of what the new rules may be, the company's main concern is doing right by its customers.

"At the end of the day, Honda is going to continue to do well for the community, for the public. They care about fuel economy, they care about building vehicles that are hybrid, plugin hybrid, electric vehicles, and they want to do a better job for their clients to make sure they get the most fuel efficient vehicles as well as getting the longevity that they always had," added Idell.

Revoking the Clean Air Act waiver will also affect 13 other states which previously adopted California's stricter emission standards.

President Trump posted on Twitter that "there will be very little difference in emissions between the California standard and the new U.S. standard, but the cars will be far safer and much less expensive"

Tom Messenger, a San Luis Obispo resident says he's worried about the environmental consequences.

"Lowering it will cause more smog and if the miles per gallon goes down, we'll use more gas and that's what will cause global warming" said Messenger.