How revolutionary is California’s ban on petrol-powered cars?

California’s politicians love to shout about the Golden State’s green reputation. Gavin Newsom, the Democratic governor, boasted early this year that California “has no peers” on climate policy. On August 25th he welcomed the latest addition to its environmental credentials. The California Air Resources Board (carb), the state’s air-pollution regulator, voted to ban the sale of petrol-powered cars by 2035. The decision wasn’t a surprise. Mr Newsom issued an executive order in 2020 directing the agency to create the rule, and regulators officially proposed the ban back in April. What will California’s new policy mean for the state, and for America?

California has good reason to want to speed up its transition to electric vehicles (evs). The state is car-crazy. About 41% of its greenhouse-gas emissions come from transport, compared with 27% nationally. Mr Newsom has been scolded by some progressive Democrats and environmental groups who believe that his administration has not done enough to tackle climate change. This ban may help quieten the critics.

But the rule’s effects could reverberate far beyond California. The climate denialism of Donald Trump’s administration and near-gridlock in Congress has meant that states’ policies are integral to action against climate change. Lately there has been progress at the federal level: the Inflation Reduction Act, passed this month, is America’s most significant climate legislation to date, and its incentives are intended to encourage people to buy evs. But America lacks a federal mandate to phase out petrol-powered cars. And because California began regulating vehicle emissions before the federal government, it can apply for waivers under the Clean Air Act allowing it to set stricter standards than those of the Environmental Protection Agency (epa). Other states can choose to follow the epa’s rules on vehicle emissions, or California’s. By 2022, 16 states had adopted California’s regulations.

California is one of the world’s largest car markets, so its ban alone could encourage the auto industry to rev up even further its large investments in evs. If other states follow California’s example—and several have already confirmed that they will—that pressure will increase. But the ban will have less impact than previous world-leading regulations on emissions and safety. America is a laggard when it comes to the ev revolution. The European Parliament voted in June for a ban on sales of petrol and diesel cars by 2035 and at least eight European countries already have similar, or more stringent, targets (though none of these is yet law). Britain, for example, has vowed to end the sale of petrol- and diesel-powered cars by 2030. Japan and others are also aiming for a ban by 2035.

To implement its ban successfully, California will have to overcome several obstacles. Turbo-charging ev production will mean making a lot more batteries, but supply-chain bottlenecks and geopolitics are making things difficult. President Joe Biden would like to reduce America’s reliance on China, which dominates the market for the necessary raw materials and processing capacity. Yet domestic mining and production has been slow to get off the ground. California will also need to build public charging infrastructure quickly. The state’s two most recent budgets allocated $10bn to accelerate the transition to evs. The new ban should push that effort into a higher gear.■