‘Herculean effort’: These port communities have waited decades for clean air. Why a new plan may fall short
The ports of LA and Long Beach are the biggest sources of air pollution in the LA basin. Air quality officials have drafted new rules to help electrify the ports. But community groups representing 400,000 residents say they don't go far enough or fast enough to clean up their dirty air.
In summary
The ports of LA and Long Beach are the biggest sources of air pollution in the LA basin. Air quality officials have drafted new rules to help electrify the ports. But community groups representing 400,000 residents say they don’t go far enough or fast enough to clean up their dirty air.
When Maria Reyes migrated from Mexico and settled in West Long Beach in the late 1980s, she thought it would be the perfect neighborhood to raise her growing family.
As her three children grew up and started being more active in school, they started developing strange symptoms — nose bleeds, difficulty breathing and headaches, one after the other.
Reyes didn’t realize it when she moved there, but her neighborhood has some of the worst air pollution in Southern California. She lives just a few miles from two of the world’s largest ports, where diesel trucks, trains, ships and cargo equipment spew large quantities of soot and other pollutants linked to respiratory illnesses.
For decades, officials have been struggling with how to clean up the emissions wafting from the massive ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. Now the region’s air quality regulators are mounting an effort to clean up the ports’ most polluting sources.
The South Coast Air Quality Management District has published its first draft of a long-awaited proposed rule that would require the two ports to develop a plan by August 2027 to build charging and fueling stations to switch thousands of pieces of diesel equipment, trucks and vessels to electricity and hydrogen.
The rule would aim to ensure that the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports can achieve the clean-air goals they set for themselves back in 2017: converting 100% of their diesel cargo-handling equipment — such as tractors and giant, 60-foot cranes that move containers — to zero emissions by 2030. They also aim for all drayage trucks, which haul the ports’ containers of cargo to warehouses, to run on electricity or hydrogen by 2035.
Complicating the cleanup of the two ports is that their tenants, not the harbors’ management, will have to buy and use the new cargo equipment. The ports will install the charging networks and redesign terminals. The total cost is unknown, but the Port of Long Beach alone estimated that the changes would cost the port and its tenants upwards of $1 billion.
Environmental advocates say the air district’s rule needs to be broader, with enforceable targets to clean up other sources of port pollution, such as harbor craft, and that the deadlines for zero-emission trucks and cargo equipment must be accelerated.
“We’ve been urging the South Coast air district for years, many years, to adopt a strong, indirect source review rule for the sea ports,” said Bill McGavern, a policy director for the environmental group Coalition for Clean Air. “The response from the district has been disappointing (and) we see that the ports drag their feet and delay action.”
The air quality agency is seeking public input and the board will likely vote on the rule this summer.
The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, which are the nation’s busiest seaports, are massive operations that are critical to the U.S. economy. They handle millions of tons of cargo a year worth hundreds of billions of dollars — 40% of the nation’s imports and exports of goods, from produce to electronics to pharmaceuticals.
The neighboring ports also are the region’s largest single sources of air pollution: Every day, their equipment, trucks, rail yards and ships emit 23 tons of smog-forming nitrogen oxides, half a ton of fine particles and nearly a ton of sulfur into the air, according to 2023 data from the South Coast district. That amounts to 8,472 tons of nitrogen and 183 tons of fine particles a year.
Fine particles are known to trigger asthma and heart attacks, while nitrogen oxides bake in the sun with other pollutants to form a gas in smog that also causes respiratory problems.
The two ports are responsible for about a fifth of the Los Angeles region’s nitrogen oxides, so massive reductions are needed — not just voluntary efforts — if the region’s residents are ever to breathe air deemed healthy to breathe, according to South Coast air quality district officials.
Cleaning up the ports is especially important as cargo volumes are projected to double by 2040, which would release even more tons of fine particles and other dangerous pollutants into the air.
And now that California officials, facing opposition from the Trump administration, had to abandon two rules that mandated zero-emission trucks and locomotives statewide, cleaning cup the ports will be even more challenging.
The Los Angeles basin has the nation’s worst air quality, so regulators are struggling to find new ways to meet state and federal health standards for smog and fine particles.
A line of diesel semi-trucks to and from the Port of Los Angeles backs up along Drumm Avenue in Wilmington, creating a congestion point in the neighborhood. Photo by Alisha Jucevic for CalMatters
First: Diesel trucks carrying port cargo exit Yusen Terminals at the Port of Los Angeles. Last: A hydrogen-powered gantry crane loads a shipping container onto a truck at the port. Photos by Joel Angel Juarez for CalMatters
Nitrogen oxides, which are emitted by vehicles and industrial plants, must be cut 80% by 2037 in the four-county Los Angeles basin, according to Sarah Rees, the district’s deputy executive officer of planning and rule development.
Even if the ports achieve their goals of 100% zero-emission cargo equipment and drayage trucks, that would only reduce 14% of their smog-forming emissions, air quality officials said.
“Getting to this (clean fuel) infrastructure problem is something that’s absolutely essential, because it is so critical to having widespread deployment of zero emission technology across the board,” Rees said.
Cleaning up the LA basin’s air “requires that we take all feasible measures,” she said.
“Significantly more emission reductions will need to be achieved from the largest source of emissions in our region,” added Nahal Mogharabi, the district’s spokesperson.
“We want to be able to maintain the strong economy and the strong workforce that we have here in Southern California…To do that, we have to make sure that we’re not disproportionately burdening the communities closest to us.” Renee Moilanen, the Port of Long Beach.
The two ports already have taken substantial steps to reduce air pollution. Since 2005, diesel particulates from the port have dropped by about 91% and smog-forming gases by about 72% — even as cargo volume increased more than 15%, port officials said.
In Long Beach, port officials say phasing out diesel fuels and reducing emissions as quickly as possible remains their biggest priority.
“We want to be able to maintain the strong economy and the strong workforce that we have here in Southern California, which is very much tied to the goods movement industry. To do that, we have to make sure that we’re not disproportionately burdening the communities closest to us,” said Renee Moilanen, director of environmental planning for the Port of Long Beach, which handles cargo valued at $300 billion a year, mostly from East Asia.
‘Why is this happening in my community?’
Beatriz Reyes, Maria Reyes’ oldest daughter, remembers attending William Logan Stephens Junior High in West Long Beach and running laps in a field next to a rail yard. The churning and grinding sounds of trains echoed in the field as the children breathed in the fumes.
Many of her classmates had asthma symptoms, like her. She thought it was just a part of growing up. It wasn’t until her 20s, after she got sick with bronchitis, that she got her first inhaler. The mother and daughter started learning about the pollution in their air.
“You think it’s normal, that it happens in all the communities, but once you leave your community to a nicer area, you just automatically feel better breathing that air,” Beatriz Reyes said. “And I’m like, OK, this is environmental racism. Why is this happening in my community?”
Reyes is one of nearly 400,000 people who live in the portside communities of San Pedro, Wilmington, Carson and West Long Beach.
A neighborhood in San Pedro is in the shadow of the Port of Los Angeles. The massive, 7,500-acre seaport is the largest and busiest container port in the United States. Photo by Alisha Jucevic for CalMatters
Life expectancy in West Long Beach is eight years shorter than wealthier neighborhoods farther away from the ports, according to data from the city’s Department of Health and Human Services. There could be many explanations, such as socioeconomic factors, but community advocates fear that pollution is contributing to the shorter lifespans.
On her way home to San Pedro after visiting family in Wilmington, Maria Montes often sits in heavy traffic, sandwiched between big diesel trucks spewing smelly diesel exhaust that seeps into her car.
“All day they’re coming in and out,” she said. “I see long lines of them one after the other from San Pedro to the other side of Wilmington.”
Maria Montes visits San Pedro Plaza Park in Wilmington, near the Port of Los Angeles. Montes, who has asthma, has lived for 30 years in San Pedro, which the air is polluted from the port and the diesel trucks hauling its cargo. Photo by Alisha Jucevic for CalMatters
Montes has been struggling with asthma for 15 years. Her son, now an adult, also had asthma as a child. A family member in Wilmington has cancer that she fears might have been linked to pollution. The garden in her yard won’t grow because the dirt is contaminated, she said.
Taking a deep breath, especially in Wilmington, can feel different than it feels in other parts of Los Angeles, she said. “You can’t breathe the same. You feel a heaviness. You feel a little bit like you’re drowning.”
Pollution from the port extends far beyond portside neighborhoods. On their way to their final destinations, trucks and trains carrying port cargo emit diesel exhaust in South Los Angeles and inland communities of San Bernardino and Riverside counties.
“You think it’s normal, that it happens in all the communities, but once you leave your community to a nicer area, you just automatically feel better breathing that air. And I’m like, okay, this is environmental racism.”Beatriz Reyes, resident of west long beach
Because the state air board withdrew its zero-emission truck and train rules, “we now expect significantly more emissions from trucks and locomotives in years to come,” Mogharabi said .
Trucks and locomotives will emit 15 to 20 tons more smog forming nitrogen oxides per day by 2030 than if the state rules were enforced.
“It’s all the more reason why we really need our local air regulators… to take more seriously what we need to do locally to address the public health crisis that port pollution causes,” said Fernando Gaytan, an attorney with the environmental group Earthjustice.
Typically the air quality district regulates “stationary” sources of pollution, such as power plants and refineries. But it also has some authority to regulate vehicles and other mobile sources if they support high-polluting industries, such as ports and warehouses, through “indirect source” rules. It’s a way to hold industries accountable for playing a role in generating that pollution.
The air district has so far implemented one such indirect source rule for freight hubs. Large warehouses, for instance, must reduce pollutants related to their operations, such as choosing to do business with companies that have zero-emission trucks.
Advocates fear the air district’s new port proposal won’t reduce emissions until hydrogen and electric charging stations are built and used, which could take many years, and isn’t guaranteed.
“It really is unfortunate the direction that the port (rule) has gone,” said Chris Chavez, deputy policy director for the Coalition for Clean air. “Despite this massive, massive compromise by South Coast AQMD to basically give up on trying to get emission reductions, you still have the ports goods movement industry standing in the way and pushing away any kind of action.”
Port officials say too much of the onus to make the transition is on them. Instead, they are seeking an “enforceable agreement” that will allow them more flexibility to collaborate with terminal operators and utility companies.
A vehicle hauls a Wan Hai shipping container at Yusen Terminals at the Port of Los Angeles near San Pedro. Photo by Joel Angel Juarez for CalMatters
Port companies view the rule as problematic because it gives the air district too much control over their businesses, said Thomas Jelenić, vice president of the Pacific Maritime Shipping Association.
“The entire port complex could be eliminated tomorrow and we would not be much closer to achieving our (air pollution) attainment goals,”he said. “So this is not an issue that rests on the port. This is an issue that rests upon the entire region.”
The ports have two years to present their plan to the air quality agency, and, if they can demonstrate that circumstances out of their control affect the timeline for electric and hydrogen equipment and trucks, they can request changes.
Rees said the air quality agency views the port rule as “incremental” and air regulators will continue to look for ways to reduce port emissions.
“We know it’s going to take some time, and we know that’s an unsatisfying answer to a lot of the communities, but we know also how hard it is. Without this, we’re never going to get to zero-emission technology,” Rees said.
Obstacles to electrifying the ports
The two ports are growing rapidly as imports and exports increase. Last year was the busiest year ever at the Long Beach port, which moved 9.6 million container units. The port of Los Angeles had its second busiest year in its 117-year history, moving 10.3 million container units, which is almost a 20% increase in cargo volume compared to 2023. Over the last 20 years, the longshore workforce has increased 74%.
Most of the nearly 4,000 pieces of cargo-handling equipment at the ports is run by diesel. That includes equipment like top handler vehicles that stack containers coming off ships, large gantry cranes that place containers onto trucks for delivery to customers, and yard tractors, which move containers within the terminal.
Yusen Terminals is testing the nation’s first-ever hydrogen fuel cell rubber tire gantry crane, the massive device that moves ship containers around the port, said Matthew Hamilton, the terminal operator’s director of sustainability. The company also owns seven electric-powered top handler vehicles.
First: Yusen Terminals has seven zero-emission top handler vehicles and is testing the nation’s first-ever hydrogen fuel cell rubber tire gantry crane, shown here at the Port of Los Angeles. The crane moves containers of cargo around the port. Last: Electric top handlers are parked at a charging station. Photos by Joel Angel Juarez for CalMatters
Yusen Terminals’ hydrogen-powered crane moves shipping containers at Yusen Terminals at the Port of Los Angeles, near San Pedro. Photo by Joel Angel Juarez for CalMatters
The ports act largely as a landlord, with no authority to mandate truck fleet owners, terminal operators and rail yard companies to clean up their equipment. However, they can offer incentives for certain activities.
The ports’ Clean Truck Program collects a $10 fee for each container unit that ships carry into the port. The Long Beach port has disbursed $60 million in incentives to truck owners who buy zero-emission trucks.
A major challenge for the ports in transitioning to electric equipment is having sufficient power to fuel it.
Yusen Terminals, for instance, only has enough power to charge 25% to 50% of its fleet of top handlers and other vehicles. It could take up to eight years for the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power to supply the port terminals with enough power to charge all of its cargo-handling equipment, Hamilton said.
Long Beach port officials estimate they’ll need six to 12 times more power to fully electrify 1,500 pieces of equipment with a charger for each one.
“It’s going to take a pretty Herculean effort to achieve (the LA port’s zero-emission goals), but we’re working very aggressively to achieve that. We still believe we can.”Matthew Hamilton, Yusen Terminals at the port of la
Electrifying equipment will also essentially require the ports to redesign terminals and change how they operate. Zero-emission cargo-handling equipment currently available can’t last an eight-hour shift without recharging, Moilanen said.
“It’s going to take a pretty Herculean effort to achieve (the port’s zero-emission goals), but we’re working very aggressively to achieve that. We still believe we can,” said Hamilton of Yusen Terminals.
The port rule, he added, “may just be adding additional requirements and slowing us down and kind of sapping our resources for buying more equipment and working on these infrastructure projects.”
Cleaning up heavy-duty trucks is another massive challenge. Some fleet owners are already investing in new electric and hydrogen trucks to service the ports. But these drayage companies, often small or owner operated, are struggling to make the same revenue they did with cheaper diesels and facing technological challenges using the cleaner vehicles, such as long charging times and insufficient range.
In recent months, the ports have received hundreds of millions of dollars in state and federal grants to improve zero-emission infrastructure that will help them with their growth and emission reduction goals. The Los Angeles port received a $412 million grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to electrify 400 pieces of diesel cargo-handling equipment, and it’s investing another $500 million in a project to upgrade the electrical grid.
“This is how we serve our planet, by collaborating as a port community and contributing to a global effort to build a cleaner world. We’re pushing the boundaries of what’s possible because that’s the only way to secure lasting progress,” said Port of Los Angeles Executive Director Eugene Seroka at a state of the port event in January.
The Port of Los Angeles is visible in the background from Wilmington Waterfront Park in Wilmington, on Feb. 12, 2025. Photo by Alisha Jucevic for CalMatters
The ports have had their joint Clean Air Action Plan since 2005, after environmental and community groups pushed them to strategize how to clean up emissions. The plan was updated in 2017 to add the goals of 100% zero-emission cargo-handling equipment by 2030 and trucks by 2035.
Some of the ports’ creative, voluntary incentives for terminal operators, ships and trucks have turned into state regulations. For instance, their programs mean that many ships have the cleanest engines, reduce speeds when nearing the port and plug in to electrical systems to avoid idling diesel engines. Now the state requires all container ships that arrive in California ports to plug in at berth.
The high cost of pollution in port communities
As a child in school in the 1990s, Roberto Reyes, who is Maria Reyes’ son, couldn’t play many sports without heavy nosebleeds. Doctors couldn’t say for sure what caused them.
Elizabeth, her youngest, would run throughout the neighborhood, past street intersections busy with diesel truck traffic as part of her track team training. Some days, she’d come home vomiting, with nosebleeds or bad headaches.
“This time I knew that it was the pollution,” Reyes said.
Thirty years later, Reyes now is a staunch community advocate with the Long Beach Alliance for Children with Asthma. She still regrets choosing to live in a neighborhood so close to the ports.
“I feel guilty about the place I chose for my children to be born,” she said. “It’s a very cruel thing. I know I shouldn’t feel guilty, but when you have all this pollution around you, you think, ‘well what do I do now?’ ”
