Obama plans new fuel limit by 2016

[Adelante]

President Barack Obama will announce plans on Tuesday for a national fuel-economy and greenhouse-gas standard for automobiles in an effort to give more certainty to car companies as they struggle for survival, industry and administration sources told POLITICO on Monday.

The administration will bill the tailpipe-emissions announcement as historic, because it avoids a patchwork of standards and has won agreement from so many stakeholders, including automakers, state governments, the Department of Transportation and the Environmental Protection Agency.

The national emissions policy for autos, which will ramp up to a new mileage-per-gallon standard in 2016, will harmonize the CAFE standard and the EPA's greenhouse-gas standard, so that industry will not have to worry that the administration will regulate those on separate tracks.

-snip

The Corporate Average Fuel Economy standard was established by Congress in 1975 in response to the Arab Oil embargo.

On Obama’s seventh day in office, he directed his Transportation Department to establish higher fuel efficiency standards for carmakers' 2011 model year “so that we use less oil and families have access to cleaner, more efficient cars and trucks.”

“This rule will be a down payment on a broader and sustained effort to reduce our dependence on foreign oil,” he said. “Going forward, my administration will work on a bipartisan basis in Washington and with industry partners across the country to forge a comprehensive approach that makes our economy stronger and our nation more secure.”

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0509/22650.html

[krispos42]

1. Just keep ramping that CAFE up

It's been flat since 1986.


Have all-electric cars get an EPA rating of, say, 100 mpg for the purposes of CAFE, and the automakers will practially give them away so they can sell high-profit SUVs and pickups.

[NYC_SKP]

2. I've never forgiven every president since Carter for dropping the CAFE ball...

No leadership on this very important and quite obvious matter for all these years.

Combining the data in these two graphs tell a sad and wasteful story...



Fuel Economy of Cars, Light Trucks, and Total Fleet (combined):




Falling Market Share of Cars (vs Light Trucks aka Pickups and SUVs):



Flat MPGs but growing share going to Light Trucks means much worse fuel economy for the average vehicle driven.

:patriot: