Transportation committee votes to repeal clean car rules before expiration

California or Washington, D.C.?

This isn’t a quiz about your summer travel plans, but about from which place you’d like to take direction when it comes to setting automotive emissions standards. Each state has the right to choose whether they want to go with the federal standard or the more stringent rules that California put in place in 2012 called “Advanced Clean Cars I.”

Through the rulemaking process, Minnesota chose in 2021 to go with the California standards, joining 17 other states and the District of Columbia in adopting the rules. They became effective in 2024 for vehicles of model year 2025, expiring when the first 2026 models hit the showrooms later this year.

But Rep. Tom Murphy (R-Underwood) would like to see Minnesota dispense with the rules sooner. He’s sponsoring HF376, a six-line bill that would repeal that set of rules.

On Wednesday, the House Transportation Finance and Policy Committee approved the bill on a voice vote and referred it to the House Environment and Natural Resources Finance and Policy Committee.

“The California car mandate adds mandates for the auto manufacturers,” Murphy said. “It hurts our auto industry. It actually requires car dealers to carry more (electric vehicles) that can drive up the cost. And it limits consumer choices.”

But Frank Kohlasch, assistant commissioner for air and climate policy at the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, spoke against the bill.

“Minnesota is already more than halfway through model year 2025, which is the only model year to which the rule applies,” he said. “Repealing the rule at this midpoint of the compliance year is unnecessary and will not provide any substantial benefit to the automobile manufacturers or to the state.

“Automobile manufacturers are the only entities regulated by the Minnesota clean cars rule. It creates no regulatory obligations on dealers or consumers. The rule ensures that Minnesotans have the choices to buy the cleanest type of vehicle that they want.”

“They say that we are not regulated, but we are the most affected by this rule,” said Scott Lambert, president of the Minnesota Automobile Dealers Association. “Minnesota dealers are not anti-electric vehicles. … We are anti-EV mandates.”

When Rep. Larry Kraft (DFL-St. Louis Park) asked Lambert what mandates are included in the state’s rules, he said that “there is a mandate on dealers to buy vehicles from manufacturers.”

Barring any new state government action, Minnesota will revert to federal emissions standards later this year.