Tesla – hailed for planet-friendly ‘green’ electric vehicles

• Tesla was sued by an environmental justice non-profit on Monday 
• The suit claimed that the Musk’s company repeatedly violated the Clean Air Act
• Tesla is accused of exposing people to harmful chemicals through its paint shop

Tesla, Elon Musk‘s’ plant-friendly ‘green’ electric vehicle company, has been sued over emissions from its California plant. 

The multi-billion dollar company was sued by a non-profit, the Environmental Democracy Project, that accused the company of violating the federal Clean Air Act hundreds of times out of its Fremont plant. 

The Clear Air Act is a primary federal air quality law that was established to control and reduce air pollution across the country. 

According to a complaint filed on Monday, since January 2021, Tesla has exposed nearby residents with harmful chemicals, including nitrogen oxides, arsenic, cadmium, and more, mainly through its paint shop operations.

The Environmental Democracy Project wants an injunction to halt excess pollution, and the company to pay civil fines up to $121,275 per day per violation of the Clean Air Act. 

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in San Francisco, added to pressure on Tesla to improve air quality surrounding the Fremont plant, the company’s main plant in the US. 

DailyMail.com contacted Tesla and the Environmental Democracy Project for comment. 

On May 2, the Bay Area Air Quality Management District said it wanted an independent hearing board to order Tesla to reduce harmful emissions from its paint shop operations.

It said that Tesla’s emissions abatement system breaks down ‘repeatedly,’ and the automaker has racked up 112 notices of violation since 2019, each accounting for as much as 750lbs of illegal air pollution.

In February, Tesla agreed to pay $1.5million to settle a lawsuit by 25 California counties that claimed it mishandled hazardous waste at locations across the state.

The Environmental Democracy Project said it has authority to file a ‘citizen’ lawsuit under the Clean Air Act because Tesla ‘has violated or in violation of conditions imposed by an operating permit for major sources of pollution.’

According to the Environmental Democracy’s Project website, the environmental justice non-profit ‘aims to educate, advocate for, and litigate on behalf of black and brown community members on Environmental injustices.’ 

The group gets involved in litigation in an effort ‘to hold polluters and greenwashers accountable,’ as well as holding ‘government entities accountable for swift and effective enforcement of pollution violations.’ 

The non-profit previously teamed up with the Oakland Cannery Collective and Center for Environmental Health to fight for more than nine ‘unpermitted diesel generators’ to be removed, according to the site. 

In 2004, the EPA claimed that they didn’t have power under the federal Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gas pollution,’ according to California’s Department of Justice. 

As a result, Massachusetts, California and other states filed lawsuits. 

By April 2007, the US Supreme Court determined that greenhouse gases are ‘air pollutants’ under the act. 

‘California has supported EPA’s actions to regulate greenhouse gas emissions against industry challenge,’ the state’s Department of Justice said.

Attorney General Rob Bonta has ‘encouraged’ the EPA to regulate greenhouse emissions from motor vehicles, aircrafts, boats, ‘non-road vehicles’ and power plants. 

This is not the first time the company has been at the center of a lawsuit, as Tesla reached a confidential settlement last month with the family of the Apple engineer who was killed in a fiery crash as he played a game on his phone inside of his Model X.

Walter Huang, 38, died when his car, which was in self-driving mode, smashed into a concrete barrier on a California freeway in March 2018. 

His family filed a negligence and wrongful death lawsuit in 2019 seeking to hold Musk’s company liable for repeatedly exaggerating the capabilities of the car’s self-driving technology.

In early April, just a day before the trial was set to begin, the company reached an undisclosed settlement in the case. 

In a court filing requesting to keep the sum private, Tesla said it agreed to settle the case in order to ‘end years of litigation.’

They claimed that the technology, dubbed Autopilot, was promoted in egregious ways that caused vehicle owners to believe they didn’t have to remain vigilant while they were behind the wheel. 

Evidence indicated that Huang was playing Sega’s Total War: Three Kingdoms video game on his iPhone when he crashed the vehicle after dropping his son off at preschool. 

He activated the Autopilot feature on his Model X for his commute to his job at Apple.

But less than 20 minutes later, Autopilot veered the vehicle out of its lane and began to accelerate before barreling into a barrier located at a perilous intersection on a busy highway in Mountain View, California.

The Model X was still traveling at more than 70 miles per hour at the time. Huang was pronounced dead at the scene, leaving behind his wife and two children, now 12 and nine-years-old.