State Wants Cleaner Diesel Exhaust

By Ed Joyce / Reporter, KPBS Public Broadcasting

Published February 20, 2007 at 12:36 PM PST

This story was published more than 17 years ago.

A California state agency wants to reduce harmful diesel exhaust from off-road construction machinery. Proposed regulations would require commercial vehicles to change their engines or buy new equipme

A California state agency wants to reduce harmful diesel exhaust from off-road construction machinery. Proposed regulations would require commercial vehicles to change their engines or buy new equipment. KPBS Reporter Ed Joyce has details.

The California Air Resources Board rules would require owners to re-equip their off-road construction machines with cleaner engines. The equipment includes graders, bulldozers - the huge, mostly yellow vehicles. Michael Lewis represents major Southern California contractors. He says the regulations would cost the industry about $12 billion to change their equipment.

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Lewis: We would have to virtually eliminate most of the existing construction fleets and replace them with the very newest equipment, that some of which isn't even available on the market yet, by 2020. And we don't think that there's enough money or time to do it by that date.

Lewis says contractors want to extend the timeline until 2027. California says diesel exhaust particulate matter is a toxic air contaminant. The state says the exhaust can cause cancer, premature death, and other health problems. Ed Joyce, KPBS News.

Ed Joyce

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Ed Joyce was the environment reporter and afternoon news anchor for KPBS-FM. Before joining KPBS, he worked as an editor/columnist with Copley News Service in San Diego. Ed has an extensive background in newspaper, radio, web and TV journalism. After graduating with a B.A. in Communications from the University of Washington in Seattle, Ed began a career in broadcast journalism. His work has included stints in public broadcasting, commercial broadcasting and education -- working as an affiliate professor of communication and reporter at the University of Idaho and Washington State University in Pullman, Wash. During the past 20 years he has worked in radio, TV and print as a news reporter, anchor, writer, editor and producer. Along the way he has won numerous awards for general news reporting, newswriting, feature and issue reporting and breaking news reporting from The Associated Press, The Society of Professional Journalists, San Diego Press Club and other organizations. During the mid-1990s, while working for Oregon Public Broadcasting, he was a frequent contributor to National Public Radio, including a feature report on the memorial service for 14 U.S. Forest Service "hotshots" who died fighting a wildfire in Colorado (the crew was based in a central Oregon town). He’s also filed reports with Marketplace, KQED’s California Report and Climate Watch and with national and regional networks throughout the United States. At KPBS, Ed continues his contributions to National Public Radio and other national and regional news organizations. He has won awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and San Diego Press Club for his environmental reporting at KPBS-FM-TV and for producing and anchoring radio newscasts. In 2007 he was selected a National Press Foundation fellow for Understanding Violent Weather II program. The seminars were held at the National Weather Center in Norman, Okla. In 2008 he spoke at a UC San Diego conference on U.S. National Security as part of the school’s Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation. Ed led a discussion with the 18 foreign government officials and academics about the political debate over climate change. In 2010, Ed was elected to a three-year term on the board of the San Diego Press Club.

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