An appeals court has denied the American Trucking Associations’ request for rehearing on the California Air Resources Board’s authority to continue enforcing a measure regarding diesel-fueled Transport Refrigeration Units and TRU generator sets.

On June 3, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit denied ATA’s petition for a rehearing on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s authorization for CARB to enforce the TRU Airborne Toxic Control Measure.

ATA will not pursue the case further because it does not raise issues that the Supreme Court would likely review, said Clayton Boyce, an ATA vice president and press secretary.

“We knew securing en banc review was a long shot, but thought the well-reasoned dissent in the previous decision would have helped the argument that California was creating a de facto
national standard that was unfair to carriers based outside of California,” Boyce said.

The court had previously ruled the EPA reasonably applied the authorization criteria of the Clean Air Act in granting CARB authorization to enforce the TRU emissions measure. The board has been actively enforcing the TRU measure’s In-Use Performance Standards since January and the registration requirements since August.

CARB has scheduled workshops on the measure for July 8 and Aug. 5 in Sacramento, but the workshops are also available through webcast and conference call-in. More information is available at www.arb.ca.gov/diesel/tru.htm.