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Take Action: Protect Clean Cars + Clean Air

June 29, 2021

Generation180 is joining electric vehicle advocates, climate organizations, and public health experts nationwide to urge the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to restore state leadership on vehicle pollution regulation through the Advanced Clean Car Standards.

Not sure what that means? That’s okay! We’re here to walk you through it. Long story short, the Advanced Clean Cars Program is one of the most effective policies states can pass to accelerate electric vehicle (EV) adoption, but states need permission from the federal government to implement this program. The previous administration rescinded this permission, but now the EPA is considering reinstating it. To ensure that this authority is restored and accelerate EV adoption nationwide, the EPA needs to hear from EV advocates like you!

Submit Comments to Support EV Adoption

So how can you get involved? By helping us tell the EPA that it’s time to get more EVs on the road and restore the clean car standards! Comments are due by July 6th, and we’ve made it easy for you. Simply copy the text below and go to this link to submit your comment. Easy peasy!

Script to copy:

As an American who supports our nation’s transition to clean energy, I know that electric vehicles are an important solution to addressing the climate emergency. Therefore, I’m writing to express my support for the EPA’s restoration of the Clean Air Act waiver for state greenhouse gas pollution and zero-emission vehicle standards for cars and trucks.

The transportation sector is the largest source of climate pollution in the U.S., accounting for nearly one-third of our nation’s greenhouse gas emissions. The transportation sector also contributes significantly to pollution that negatively impacts public health, and these impacts are felt disproportionately by low-income communities and communities of color.

The previous administration’s decision to undercut state authority to tackle air pollution from vehicles took away a crucial tool for addressing climate and air pollution. It’s imperative that the EPA restore the clean car standards so that states can continue to lead in fighting climate change and transition to a clean energy economy. Enabling states to adopt and implement clean car standards will ensure we are protecting our communities and driving further investment in pollution-free transportation solutions.

Together, we can ensure that the U.S. enjoys zero-emissions vehicles, cleaner air, and a clean energy future for all.

Click here to submit your comment to the EPA by July 6th!

Blog

An opportunity to invest in a better future

May 20, 2020

On most (quarantine) days, it might feel a smidge perverse to think of the COVID-19 crisis as an opportunity. Our economy is going to hell, we’re losing jobs in droves, and we can’t even go enjoy a good restaurant meal. But in our shattered state, we also have a chance to rebuild—healthier, more resilient, and more equitable than before. We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity—and a responsibility—to move our country forward to a healthier future rather than backward to a status quo ridden with critical underlying conditions (read: climate crisis, inequities, broken healthcare system…). This cartoon (from illustrator Brenna Quinlan) captures the moment well:

Screen Shot 2020-05-14 at 3.05.21 PM

Putting stimulus funding toward clean energy is a critical way our government can capitalize on this opportunity and move us forward.

By investing in industries like wind, solar, electric transportation, and others, we can emerge from this crisis closer to unlocking the clean air, healthier communities, stable domestic energy sources, and massive job- and value-creation that clean energy offers. To be clear: the transition to clean energy is already underway; we now have a chance to accelerate it—in a game-changing way. So let’s tell our representatives how we want our money invested.

If this thinking resonates with you, you’re not alone: most of the American public is already on board. In an April poll, two-thirds of voters supported giving stimulus funding to renewable energy companies, while less than half supported bailouts for the oil and gas industry. Accelerating the clean energy transition in this moment isn’t a technical or PR problem—it’s a political one.

To emerge from this pandemic crisis stronger than when we started, we need to focus on “building civilization back in a hardier and more resilient form,” as climate advocate Bill McKibben recently put it. Isn’t that part of the American ethos? So—why can’t a clean energy economy be the next great chapter in our country’s history?

Originally published in the 5/20/20 edition of our Flip the Script newsletter.