BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 462
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CONCURRENCE IN SENATE AMENDMENTS
AB 462 (Bonnie Lowenthal)
As Amended June 30, 2011
Majority vote
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|ASSEMBLY: |58-1 |(April 14, |SENATE: |36-0 |(July 14, |
| | |2011) | | |2011) |
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Original Committee Reference: TRANS.
SUMMARY : Authorizes an air pollution control district or a
regional air quality management district (district), until
January 1, 2015, to use motor vehicle registration fee revenues
to replace natural gas fuel tanks or fueling infrastructure.
The Senate amendments are substantially similar to the bill
version as passed by the Assembly and basically:
1)Clarify that the revenues from motor vehicle registrations are
to be governed by the provisions of the Lower-Emission School
Bus Program (LESBP).
2)Clarify that the Department of Motor Vehicles is limited to 1%
of fee revenues collected to be used as reimbursement of its
administrative costs.
3)Double-joint the provisions of this bill with AB 470
(Halderman) of 2011.
EXISTING LAW :
1)Authorizes a district, until January 1, 2015, to establish a
fee of up to $6 on the registration of motor vehicles
registered in the district.
2)Requires the revenues from the first $4 of the fee be used for
specified purposes. Requires that the revenues from the last
$2 of the fee be used to implement programs to remediate
the air pollution harms caused by motor vehicles under the
Carl Moyer program, the new purchase, retrofit, repower, or
add-on of equipment for previously unregulated agricultural
sources, the new purchase of school buses pursuant to the
LESBP, and an accelerated vehicle retirement or repair
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program.
3)Under the Federal Clean Air Act passed in 1970, establishes
requirements and standards for the national air pollution
control program. Basic elements of the act include national
ambient air quality standards for major air pollutants,
hazardous air pollutants standards, state attainment plans,
motor vehicle emissions standards, stationary source emissions
standards and permits, acid rain control measures,
stratospheric ozone protection, and enforcement provisions.
4)Confers, under state law, authority to the California Air
Resources Board (ARB) over emission standards for mobile
sources. The law does not confer authority to ARB to issue
permits directly to stationary sources of air pollution.
Instead, state law provides that districts have jurisdiction
over emission standards for non-mobile, or stationary,
sources.
AS PASSED BY THE ASSEMBLY , this bill authorized:
1)A district to use the last $2 of the $6 registration fee from
motor vehicles registered within the district to replace
onboard natural gas fuel tanks on school buses owned by a
school district that are 15 years or older, not to exceed
$20,000 per bus.
2)The use of the funds to replace or enhance the deteriorating
natural gas fueling
dispensers of fueling infrastructure operated by a school
district, not to exceed $500 per dispenser.
FISCAL EFFECT : Unknown
COMMENTS : According to the author, mobile source emissions are
major contributors to the potential cancer risk from air
pollution. Long-term studies of school children indicate that
nitrogen oxides and particulate matter emissions, such as those
from diesel-fueled school buses have much greater impacts on
limiting lung growth in children than previously believed.
Lower-Emission School Bus Program (LESBP): The primary goal of
the ARB's LESBP is to reduce school children's exposure to both
cancer-causing and smog-forming pollution. The program provides
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grant funding for new, safer school buses and to put air
pollution control equipment (i.e., retrofit devices) on buses
that are already on the road. The ARB staff, in coordination
with the California Energy Commission (CEC) and the local air
pollution control districts, has developed guidelines for
implementation of the LESBP funds. The guidelines cover which
buses and retrofits can be purchased, requirements for the CEC
and air districts running the program, and the benefits of the
program. Currently, funds can be used for new bus purchases and
retrofit pollution devices for buses but funds for
infrastructure, such as fueling dispensers, are not allowed.
Accordingly, as the original program was designed for the
purchase of new school buses, without any mention of fueling
infrastructure needs, one may question the bill's provisions
that expand the program for compressed natural gas (CNG) fuel
nozzle replacements.
Proposition 1B was approved by the statewide voters on November
7, 2006, and enacted the Highway Safety, Traffic Reduction, Air
Quality, and Port Security Bond Act of 2006. This bond act
authorized $200 million for replacing and retrofitting school
buses. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
provided an additional $1.73 million to the program.
Need for the bill: According to this bill's sponsor, the South
Coast Air Quality Management District states that LESBP "funds
can only be used by public school districts for the purchase of
new buses, including alternative fueled, e.g. compressed natural
gas (CNG) buses to replace older polluting school buses, and for
fueling infrastructure. Within the South Coast region, about
1,400 alternative fuel school buses, primarily powered by CNG,
have been purchased through the LESBP. However, the fuel tanks
on these buses have a useable life of 15 years and are only
covered by diminishing-value warranties which expire after 15
years. About 200 of these buses are going to reach their 15
year lifetime limit by 2011-12. An additional 100 to 150 buses
each year will also reach the end of their usable lives. The
older fuel tanks will result in these otherwise usable and clean
burning school buses being taken off the road prematurely. The
price for purchasing a new bus is approximately $169,000, versus
the price of replacement fuel tanks, which is approximately
$20,000. Additionally, fueling infrastructure needs updating
with time, including equipment repair or replacement."
This bill expands the use of funds pursuant to the LESBP by
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allowing the program to fund up to $20,000 for fuel tank
replacement in CNG school buses, as well as to replace fuel
dispensers for CNG infrastructure owned and operated by public
schools with one-time funding of up to $500 per dispenser.
Accordingly, making this change in the LESBP allows districts to
use the $2 portion of the motor vehicle registration fee
revenues for these school bus tank and related appurtenance
purposes.
Support: According to the Southern California utility companies
writing in support of the bill, "As CNG vehicles age, the fuel
tanks used to store CNG need to be replaced. Since many school
districts keep school buses in service for 20 or more years,
many of California's CNG school buses are nearing the time when
these fuel tanks will need to be replaced. In addition, the
fueling dispensers of the CNG fueling infrastructure will also
need to be repaired or upgraded as they age. This bill enables
school districts to complete both of these tasks."
Concerns: As a late expression of concern, the Alliance of
Automobile Manufacturers indicated that they have "serious
reservations" about this bill in terms of the $2 fee to be used
for routine maintenance instead of being spent on large capital
expenditures; the bill detracts from the intentions of the
original law that was for the purchase of new, low-emission
buses (not fuel tanks or fueling dispensers); and conformity
with Proposition 26 (as passed by the statewide voters on
November 2, 2010, that broadens the definition of a state or
local tax to include many payments currently considered to be
fees or charges and changes the vote threshold for approval from
a simple majority to a two-thirds vote).
Related bill: AB 470 (Halderman) of 2011, a similar bill, is in
the Senate.
Analysis Prepared by : Ed Imai / TRANS. / (916) 319-2093
FN: 0001467
AB 462
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