TRENTON, NJ – All new car sales in the state of New Jersey are now mandated to be electric by the year 2035 – with certain early requirements kicking in as soon as 2026 – as confirmed by Governor Phil Murphy’s office on Monday, which stated that the rule that will make the mandate possible will be filed by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection on Tuesday.
The rule in question, entitled “Advanced Clean Cars II,” (ACCII) will require car manufacturers to begin following some zero emission vehicle requirements starting with model year 2027 light duty cars, which will begin hitting the market in 2026. Further restrictions will be implemented as time goes by until 2035, at which time all new vehicle sales in New Jersey must consist of electric-only options.
The Governor’s office is expected to release additional information pertaining to the mandate on Tuesday, although Alex Ambrose, the transportation and climate policy analyst for New Jersey Policy Perspective, said that the information released so far is extremely promising.
Our state needs to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution and after this announcement, we are no longer sitting in the slow lane while other states pass us by on clean energy,” Ambrose said. “Transportation emissions have been on the rise since 2020 and account for 35 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in New Jersey, the most of any sector.”
ACCII is similar to a rule previously implemented by California, which requires automakers to slowly transition their output to electric vehicles (EVs) over several years until they consist of 51 percent of all new car sales in the state by 2027, and 100 percent by 2035.
The adoption of ACCII was celebrated by climate advocates on Monday, with Anjuli Ramos-Busot, the director of the New Jersey chapter of the Sierra Club, saying it will result in over 90,000 additional EVs on the streets of New Jersey by 2030.
One of our biggest sectors is the transportation sector and one of the biggest sources that’s contributing a lot of co-pollutants, as well as carbon, is our light-duty vehicles,” Ramos-Busot said. “Unfortunately, New Jersey’s environmental justice communities are intertwined in very congested roadways, particularly going into North Jersey and going closer into New York City. Us being positioned as a transportation hub in between two major cities like New York City and Philadelphia, this program is literally lifesaving.”
However, there are also critics of the regulations slated to be included in ACCII, with state Senator Steven Oroho (R-Sussex) noting that the currently insufficient infrastructure for EV chargers in New Jersey, combined with an electrical grid that may not be able to handle the additional load, could result in serious issues in the near future.
When our fragile electric grid is already struggling to keep up with demand, it seems like an enormous risk to force all of our homes, businesses, and cars to electrify,” Oroho said. “There’s no redundancy and there’s no safety net.”
Christopher Boyle is an investigative journalist, videographer, reporter and writer for SEARCHEN NETWORKS® as well as other independent news and media organizations in the United States. Christopher works on a wide variety of topics and fields, has been featured in print and online in a variety of publications, from local to national, and helps keep a keen-eye on what’s happening in the automotive world for Auto Buyers Market.