Over the past decade, electric cars have gone from being an oddity to an everyday sight across California with about 670,000 Teslas, Toyota Priuses, Nissan Leafs and other plug-in vehicles zipping down the roads from the Bay Area to Southern California.

Now, as the state seeks to further reduce greenhouse gases and cut diesel soot pollution, particularly in low-income neighborhoods near freeways and ports where health risks are highest, trucks are likely to be the next form of transportation to go electric.

On Thursday, the powerful California Air Resources Board is scheduled to vote on a first-in-the-nation rule that would require manufacturers to produce tens of thousands of trucks in the coming decade — from large pickup trucks to neighborhood delivery vans to 18-wheel semis — that run only on electricity and emit no tailpipe pollution.

The rule has been debated and refined over the past two years, and is being closely watched by other states and the European Union. It also comes at a time that California and the Trump administration are locked in legal battles over the state’s ability to set its own vehicle standards, something Trump opposes and Democratic nominee Joe Biden supports.

“It’s a huge deal. It’s the first time any state will have set a standard that requires truck manufacturers to sell trucks that don’t pollute,” said Kathryn Phillips, director of Sierra Club California. “People are tired of having dirty vehicles coming through their neighborhoods.”

Diesel soot contains dozens of toxic chemicals. Tiny particles lodge in the lungs of people who breathe it, increasing risk for asthma, heart disease, cancer and other illnesses, particularly in children and the elderly. People living within 500 feet of freeways are considered to have among the highest risk.

Although trucks make up only about 7% of the nearly 30 million vehicles registered in California, they produce 80% of the diesel particulate matter from vehicles and 70% of the nitrogen oxides, a major component of smog, according to air board statistics.

California has worked to reduce diesel pollution over the years, with rules cutting sulfur levels in diesel fuel, requiring more efficient engines, and passing a new law signed last year requiring large trucks to undergo a regular smog check, similar to cars.

But Thursday’s “Advanced Clean Trucks” rule, goes further, and could reshape the U.S. vehicle fleet.

Set to take effect in 2024, it would apply to new trucks weighing over 8,500 pounds. At least 40% of all new big-rig tractor trailers sold in California would have to be zero emission by 2035. For full-size pickup trucks like the Chevrolet Silverado and Ford F-250, it would require 55% of new sales to be electric by 2035. Delivery trucks and vans would have a 75% electric mandate.

The auto industry has been generally supportive, but has said it wants more time to phase in the rules.

“GM has a vision for a future with zero crashes, zero emissions and zero congestion,” wrote Barbara Kiss, director of energy and environment at General Motors, in a December letter to the air board. “We recognize that that transportation sector needs to be part of the solution, which is why we believe in an all-electric future.”

Others are more skeptical.

Many truckers are concerned about cost, battery range, and durability of the vehicles’ drive trains, said Joe Rajkovacz, a spokesman for the Western States Trucking Association, in San Bernardino County.

“The technology is intriguing but obviously not ready for prime time yet,” he said. “There are a lot of unknowns. You can have all the mandates you want, but if the technology doesn’t work the mandate won’t work.”

Major companies are beginning to climb on board. In February, Amazon announced it would order 100,000 all-electric delivery vans from Rivian, an American automaker in Detroit. Nikola, an electric truck maker in Phoenix whose customers include Anheuser Busch, went public this month and saw its share price double, making its founder, 38-year-old Trevor Milton, a billionaire.

UPS and FedEx each have ordered 1,000 electric delivery trucks.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced in 2017 that the company is developing an electric semi truck. And last year, Kenworth unveiled 10 trucks that run on hydrogen fuel cells to move freight from the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. The trucks have 560-horsepower and a range of 300 miles. Of the 11.1 billion tons of freight shipped by trucks in the United States in 2018, two-thirds were shipped less than 100 miles, according to a recent U.S. Department of Energy study.

Challenges remain. More charging stations are needed. The vehicles cost more than diesel-powered trucks, although a study by Energy Innovation, a San Francisco firm, concluded the rule would generate at least $7.3 billion in overall economic savings by 2040 and create a market for up to 500,000 new electric trucks statewide.

“When you look over the full lifetime of the vehicle, you save money because your operations and maintenance, and fuel costs, are lower,” said Amanda Myers, a policy analyst with Energy Innovation.

For residents of West Oakland, where diesel soot from freeways and the Port of Oakland have been linked to high rates of asthma and other problems, relief can’t come soon enough.

“For over 80 years people have lived with all this air pollution here,” said Margaret Gordon, co-founder of the West Oakland Environmental Indicators Project, a nonprofit group that monitors air pollution levels. “We’ll get a vaccine for coronavirus in a year or two but there is no vaccine for the air pollution. This is a civil rights issue.”