California favors tougher EPA standards

California Attorney General Brown Jerry Brown is in favor of much-stricter federal vehicle emission standards that would save almost 2 billion barrels of oil and curb greenhouse gas emissions by about 1 billion tons, filing a motion to support the effort.

Brown, who is a Democratic gubernatorial candidate, filed a motion in the U.S. Court of Appeals in support of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which is facing a legal fight with energy companies and other industries challenging much-tougher emission standards starting in 2012.

“The thousands of barrels of oil spilling in the Gulf of Mexico each day are a graphic reminder that we need to cut oil consumption in California,” Brown said in a news release Monday. “These regulations would do that, as well as vastly reducing pollution from tailpipe emissions.”

If approved by the court and enacted, the new EPA standards would also save consumers between $130 and $180 a year in fuel costs — and $240 billion nationwide for vehicles built from 2012 through 2016.

But numerous companies — including Massey Energy Co. Rosebud Mining Co., National Cattlemen’s Beef Association and the Industrial Minerals Association of North America — have challenged the EPA requirements.

Read the full post in the Sacramento Business Journal.