TRANSPORTATION FUND FOR CLEAN AIR

Assembly Bill 434 authorized the Air District to levy a $4 surcharge on all motor vehicles registered in the Bay Area in order to mitigate the impact of vehicular emissions. The Air District allocates these revenues through the Transportation Fund for Clean Air, or TFCA.

TFCA revenues are distributed in two ways. Forty percent of the TFCA funds, known as the TFCA County Program Manager Fund, are allocated directly to the region’s nine county congestion management agencies for disbursement to eligible projects. The Air District distributes the remaining 60 percent, known as the TFCA Regional Fund, to eligible projects and programs that reduce motor vehicle emissions. In 2012, eligible projects included trip reduction (i.e., shuttles and ride sharing) projects.

A portion of the TFCA Regional Fund revenues is distributed to project sponsors on a competitive basis, and a portion is used to fund several mobile-source emission-reduction programs directly administered by the Air District, such as the Smoking Vehicle Program.

MOBILE SOURCE INCENTIVE FUND

AB 923, enacted in 2004, authorized local air districts to increase their motor vehicle registration surcharge up to an additional $2 per vehicle. AB 923 stipulates that air districts may use the revenues generated by the additional $2 surcharge for any of the four programs listed below:

• Projects eligible for grants under the Carl Moyer Program;
• New purchases of clean air school buses;
• Accelerated vehicle retirement or repair program; and
• Projects to reduce emissions from previously unregulated agricultural sources.

The revenues from the additional $2 surcharge are deposited in, and administered via, the Air District’s Mobile Source Incentive Fund, or MSIF.

CARL MOYER PROGRAM

The Carl Moyer Program is a state-funded incentive program originally created by the California Legislature to reduce emissions from heavy-duty engines. Managed locally by the Air District, the Carl Moyer Program provides grants primarily for installing new, cleaner engines or emission-control devices in heavy-duty equipment, such as trucks and buses, marine vessels, construction equipment, locomotives, and agricultural irrigation pumps.

Heavy-duty diesel engines are major sources of oxides of nitrogen, reactive organic gases, and particulate matter.

LOWER-EMISSION SCHOOL BUS PROGRAM

The Lower-Emission School Bus Program provides financial incentives to purchase new buses to replace old, high-emitting public school buses, replace on-board compressed natural gas (CNG) fuel tanks on public school buses, and retrofit in-use school buses with diesel emission control devices. The primary goal of this program is to reduce the exposure of schoolchildren to harmful diesel emissions.

GOODS MOVEMENT PROGRAM

The emphasis of the Goods Movement Program is to quickly reduce air pollution emissions and health risk from freight movement at the Bay Area’s ports and along the region’s major roadways. The program funds the retrofit and replacement of older, higher-polluting diesel trucks, locomotives, cargo-handling equipment, and marine vessels, as well as the installation of shore-side power systems.