The BUILD America 250 Act: Creating a Federal Framework for Autonomous Commercial Vehicles
On May 22, the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee approved the BUILD America 250 Act, a five-year surface transportation reauthorization bill intended to replace the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), which expires on September 30, 2026. In addition to authorizing hundreds of billions of dollars in highway funding and various other measures, the bill includes several provisions focusing on the emerging autonomous trucking industry. The legislation would establish federal safety requirements for commercial autonomous vehicles (AVs), would resolve the contentious issue of warning beacons on driverless trucks, and would potentially preempt at least some state and local regulation.
U.S. Supreme Court Stays EPA Ozone Interstate Transport Rule
On Thursday, in Ohio v. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Supreme Court stayed an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rule that would have required the implementation of additional, significant emissions controls in power plants, pipelines, cement factories, glass factories, iron and steel mills, paper mills, and other industrial facilities across 23 states. The stay provides relief to those industries as they challenge various aspects of the rule in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit — challenges on which the Supreme Court found the states and industries were likely to succeed.
