The U.S. EPA on Friday approved a California plan to phase out the sale of diesel-powered heavy trucks, a move with potentially outsized ramifications. Pollution emitted from large diesel trucks is often geographically concentrated and at least six other states have already indicated that they will follow the lead of the state with the world’s fifth-largest economy. The new rules require that by 2035, half of all heavy trucks sold in the state — including garbage collection trucks, tractor-trailers, cement mixers, and other vehicles — will be fully electric. Heavy trucks disproportionately pollute the air breathed by people living in low-income communities and neighborhoods that are predominantly made up of people of color due to the racist history of siting highways through neighborhoods of color and the siting of warehouses in historically marginalized communities. (AP, Reuters, The Hill, CNBC, New York Times $)