You may notice clean air stickers on cars that charge up at electric vehicle locations. It allows them access to carpool lanes in bigger cities, but those drivers could lose that access when the decals are set to expire next year.
“The carpool lane is necessary for us to be able to commute easily,” said Harinee Soundar, Bay Area resident.
In order to meet environmental goals, both federal and California state governments have allowed drivers to use carpool lanes if they drive cars that run on natural gas, electric or plug-in hybrid.
Lara Lesuer is visiting her daughter who goes to Cal Poly and just got her electric car in December. She says she does not have a sticker but still utilizes the clean air vehicle benefits.
“I don’t think I need to. I think if I’m in the EV lane they would know that it’s definitely an electric car,” said Lara Lesuer, Bay Area resident.
The administration of HOV lanes is governed by federal law. According to the Department of Motor Vehicles, in order for California to extend the program allowing clean-air vehicles to use the carpool lanes, Congress must first act by extending the provision.
“I would say, if possible, to extend the carpool lane sticker,” Soundar said.
Harinee Soundar has had an electric car for over a year and says she uses the carpool lanes on a frequent basis. “Almost every time we commute to work we use that especially during the commute time traffic it’s really helpful,” Soundar said.
The DMV is continuing to issue the clean air vehicle decals. As of March 2024, the DMV said, there were over 411,000 cars in California with active CAV decals. Since the program began in January of 2001, the DMV has issued more than 1 million decals in California.
“It would be a bummer if it expires. It's good to have that. Before we had this, we also had a Chevy Volt and that had the sticker too which was really helpful and useful,” Soundar said.
The clean air vehicle access stickers are set to expire in September of next year.
