A proposed study on electric vehicles is reigniting debate about a mandate modeled after California regulations.
Democrats want to create a 40-person council to study how to make electric vehicles more affordable and easier to own in Connecticut.
“Our constituents really deserve a plan, that’s what we’re getting at here,” Sen. Christine Cohen (D-Guilford) said.
Republicans, though, claim the study is meant to lay the groundwork for a ban on the sale of new gas-only vehicles starting in 2035.
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Connecticut was poised to put the regulation in place because lawmakers 20 years ago agreed to follow California’s environmental standards.
Gov. Ned Lamont pulled the regulation back before it was put into place last year because of criticism.
Now Cohen, co-chair of the legislature’s Transportation Committee, said the state need to study what needs to be done so it’s ready for an increase in ownership of electric vehicles.
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Republicans warn the bill is meant to create a plan for the failed regulation. Cohen notes nothing in the bill creates such a mandate.
“I really wish my colleagues were as threatened by climate change as they seem to be about a working group with no authority,” she said.
Republicans have questions about which regulations are in place now: the California standards or those from the federal Environmental Protection Agency, which has proposed a goal that two-thirds of vehicles sold in 2032 be electric.
Republicans want to follow the EPA standard.
Cohen said the legislature can vote after the reporter – due before the next session in 2025 – but the state needs to conduct a study no matter what direction it goes.
“We have to have the regulatory framework for either of those and it's really important that we know where we’re going with this,” she said.
