The International Warehouse Logistics Association has urged the California State Assembly Natural Resources Committee to support a bill that would require the California Air Resources Board to review new emissions standards for effectiveness before adopting them. CARB is currently implementing regulations to create a statewide 10-percent reduction in the carbon intensity of California's gasoline and diesel transportation fuel by the year 2020. This ambitious goal requires the invention and commercialization of low carbon fuels that do not exist today in quantities sufficient to meet the needs of the state's market, according to the IWLA.

Introduced by Assembly Member Tony Mendoza and designated AB 2311, the legislation would require a periodic review of the development of these new technologies. It also would require CARB to avoid unreasonable impacts on California fuel supplies or prices, competitiveness of California businesses relative to out-of-state or international competitors, on the California economy and on small businesses.

"IWLA members are committed to protecting the free flow of products across domestic and international borders and ask for your 'aye' vote on this measure," Joel D. Anderson, president of IWLA, said in an April 8 letter to Wesley Chesbro, chairman of the Assembly's Natural Resources Committee, and the other members of the committee.

"Adequacy, reliability and affordability of transportation fuels are essential to the success of this extremely complex program and, unless the new fuel formulation is a well-researched, properly tested and economically viable, the low-carbon fuel standard has the potential to cause serious economic harm to California businesses as early as the first quarter of 2011," he added.

These reviews are necessary to avoid duplication of the implementation of CARB diesel in 1993. Resulting market disruptions of price and supply caused economic damage and failures of California-only businesses,  Anderson wrote.

"The 1993 fuel reformulation left third-party logistics providers with unrecoverable price spikes, stranded costs and fuel shortages," Anderson says. "AB 2311 allows third-party logistics providers to plan for and embrace low-carbon fuel specifications rather than endure a period of unintended price spikes that are inherent in fuel supply disruptions."

Source: IWLA