The United States Postal Service is being taken to court over its plan to upgrade its fleet of delivery trucks.
The USPS plans to replace its current slate of vehicles with up to 165,000 gas-powered delivery trucks, drawing criticisms that it is neglecting to fall in line with environmental review standards.
A number of environmental groups and 16 states are listed as plaintiffs in the suit.
The current USPS upgrade plan calls for almost 90% of the multibillion-dollar upgrade to be made up of gas-powered vehicles. This is in spite of requests by both the EPA and the Biden administration to rethink the plan.
The lawsuit alleges that the USPS failed to do their due diligence in evaluating the environmental impact of their planned fleet makeover, claiming the Postal Service is in violation of the National Environmental Policy Act.
“Once this purchase goes through, we'll be stuck with more than 100,000 new gas-guzzling vehicles on neighborhood streets, serving homes across our state and across the country, for the next 30 years,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said in a statement.
“There won't be a reset button.”
A separate suit being brought against the USPS by environmental organizations Clean Air Now, the Center for Biological Diversity and the Sierra Club alleges the USPS only conducted their environmental review after the vehicle purchase was already finalized.
“The purpose of environmental review is to inform the USPS's decision, not rubberstamp a plan it had already made,” attorney Scott Hochberg with the Center for Biological Diversity's Climate Law Institute said in a statement.
“Postal delivery trucks visit almost every neighborhood in the United States daily. It's backward and bewildering that the USPS would show such disregard for climate and public health with its decision.”
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