Sen. Cortese Wants California to Stop Selling Its Outdated, Polluting Diesel Trains to Other Countries to Make A Profit and More Pollution

SACRAMENTO – When the California Legislature convened today, State Senator Dave Cortese (D-Silicon Valley) introduced a bill that restricts the resale of California decommissioned diesel trains for continued use. Here is today’s Politico article on the action: POLITICO Pro | Article | California bill would restrict sale of retired diesel trains

Cortese, who is the chair of the Senate Transportation Committee, is authoring the bill because Caltrain recently finalized an agreement to transfer its retired diesel fleet to the municipality of Lima, Peru, following the electrification of its network.  The fleet includes 90 gallery cars and 19 diesel locomotives, originally built between 1985 and 1987.

“This is no way to run a railroad by taking the diesel off  California’s carbon footprint then putting it right back on in Peru. Are we not all fighting to decarbonize the same air?” asked California State Senator Dave Cortese, Senate Transportation chair. “As a world leader in decarbonization in our transportation sector, we need to lead on this. We need to be serious about decarbonization worldwide.” 

The majority of greenhouse gas emissions from transportation are carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions resulting from the combustion of petroleum-based products, like gasoline and diesel fuel, in internal combustion engines

To make our air cleaner, California has high targets for reducing our greenhouse gas emissions and is attempting to meet those targets by investing in trains that emit fewer greenhouse gas emissions. Generally this is through the replacement of locomotives with those which are either zero-emission, or lower-emission.

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