Obama Announces New Fuel Economy Standards
It’s been a long time coming, but Barack Obama has announced new fuel economy standards that, believe it or not, actually have the blessings of the automotive industry. The new standard would raise the average fuel economy of cars to 35.5 mpg and of light trucks to 30 mpg by 2016. Current standards are at 27.5 and 23.5, respectively. These standards follow the lead of the state of California’s proposed standards, which were left idling during the Bush administration, which refused to grant them a waver to enact their own standards instead of the federal numbers.
The new standards won’t have an immediate effect on new vehicles, as the standards are not set to begin increases until 2012. At that point, however, the fuel economy ratings must increase by 5% per year. This delay is designed to give automakers time to design new vehicles that conform to the upcoming standards. The new regulations also mandate a reduction in carbon emissions by 40% over the same time period.
Many cite the shaky financial situtations of major automakers as one of the reasons the new regulations went through. For years, automakers, particularly American automakers, railed against any increase in fuel economy standards as an unnecessary cost. However, considering how the market for fuel efficient vehicles has expanded in the past two years, and how two of Detroit’s Big Three automakers are now dependent on the federal government for financing, their bargaining power has been greatly reduced. One final note is that many foreign automakers, like Toyota, Honda, BMW, and Mercedes-Benz, among others, won’t have to work too hard to meet these standards, as Asian and European markets already have tougher emissions standards.Fireproof the movie
May 20th, 2009 at 3:33 pm
This has been a long time in coming.