New regulations in 2024 may leave some RVs without built-in generators

Rv Travel ^ | January 17, 2023 | Russ and Tiña De Maris

[fireman15]

Last year, California took a step that riled plenty of RVers. A new California Air Resources Board (CARB) rule essentially hit the off-switch on RV generators. While not outright banning small (less than 25 horsepower) generators, the state severely tightened emissions restrictions. The reaction was quick. The lynchpin of the RV generator industry, Cummins, announced it would no longer sell LP and gas-fired Cummins generators in California after the end of 2023. The backlash was swift. RV industry talking heads issued immediate warnings. If the regulations stuck, the RV industry would lose a million dollars in sales in the Golden State in the first year alone. So what’s the latest on this from Cummins?

Back-down on posturing? Last week, the company released a short statement, “On impact of California regulations.” It seems Cummins generators will be available in California—and elsewhere—after all. Referring back to their earlier stand that the company would simply stop selling RV generators for California consumption, the big “juice maker” company now says this: “As stated in a letter sent to RV industry partners and customers, Cummins immediately began evaluating potential options to meet the new emissions standards outlined by CARB. At that time, we transparently communicated the challenges involved and stated we would not have any spark-ignited products available for sale in California by January 1, 2024.”

Perhaps it was Cummins’ way of pressuring California regulators to cut some slack and make concessions. In the months that have passed since that volley was fired, there have been no further shots. Instead, in its January 10, 2023 statement, Cummins’ change in posture is made clear: “With significant investment in product development, we now intend to take a phased approach to release a portfolio of CARB SORE compliant products in early 2024.”

[steve86]

Our base fee residential electric base fee seems to be much lower than Chelan County's, so their low kwh charge is a bit misleading. I will go back to make sure I interpreted this correctly.

"Customer Charge:

Single-phase service: $ 0.69/day
Multi-phase service: $0.98/day
Monthly Energy Charge: $ 0.0741/kWh"

[steve86]

Yes, I checked my last utility statement. $21 base fee plus $23 utility tax. Not $135 like I think Chelan County is.

[fireman15]

It is maddening. Most of the towns in Washington see utility bills as an opportunity to tack on a bunch of taxes without and minimum fees without people having any real opportunity to object.

Just the “storm water” runoff fee for our house and property is now $110 every two months. Our property is where the storm water from the streets and surrounding properties run to. We have no storm drains. Twenty years ago, we paid about that amount every two months for electricity, water, sewer, and garbage. Now they tack on all these extra fees to the point where our bill is hundreds of dollars every two months even if we use nothing.