EPA Foregoes Enforcing Glider Emissions Regs

Nov. 2, 2020

The New York Times reports that the EPA will not hold glider kit manufacturers to the previously passed restriction of building only 300 kits per year. According to the EPA, about 10,000 glider kits are sold in the U.S. each year.

EPA reinstates restrictions

Glider kits consist of new truck bodies fitted with remanufactured or salvaged engines and transmissions that do not use exhaust gas recirculation and do not require exhaust aftertreatment. The kits are attractive to buyers because they are less expensive than new or post-2010 previously owned emissions-compliant trucks. However, environmental groups and heavy truck manufacturers oppose the glider kit vehicles because of their lack of emissions technology.

“The Agency is exercising its enforcement discretion in 2018 and 2019,” Molly Block, an agency spokeswoman, said in a statement late Friday, meaning that it is notifying glider manufacturers that even though the limit legally remains in place, the companies can effectively ignore it.

The agency, she said, is also considering formally delaying the 300-unit cap until December 2019, by which point it hopes to have permanently repealed the cap.

Read the NYT report here.