Regulators Want Old Diesel Engines To Clean Up...Or Clear Out
On May 1, the thick morning fog began to lift off the San Fernando Valley, leaving a smoggy haze in its place. Two mechanics dressed in jeans and tee-shirts were preparing to drop a new 15-liter diesel engine into a 30-year-old scraping machine. Repowering old, polluting construction machinery is becoming a common practice in California as air quality districts place local restrictions on projects.
One thing about this scene was unusual, though. The operation was taking place not in a maintenance shop, but in the middle of a large jobsite. The 14.7-million-cu-yd earthmoving project in Porter Ranch, a development of new homes north of Los Angeles, has about a dozen scrapers gouging the earth there every day. Some have black plumes of smoke billowing out of them; some don’t.