Obama Steers American Cars Into the 21st Century
After years of unimproved fuel economy in America's cars, President Obama is taking action. If all goes well, in just a few years the cars on America's roadways will be more efficient.
When it comes to fuel economy standards, it’s a rare sight to see the automobile industry and the environmental community together on the same platform. But that’s the view we got today when the president announced new fuel economy standards for America’s fleets.
Obama’s announcement will resolve a long tug of war between car companies on the one hand and California (and 13 other states) on the other, which have been trying to implement their own greenhouse gas emission standards
for cars.
California's Clean Car law, passed in 2002 and adopted by 13 other states, would effectively mandate higher fuel economy in cars sold in those states while slashing greenhouse gas emissions. The automobile industry tried to block the law because it would supercede the federal government's less stringent standards. While George W. was in the White House, the carmakers pretty much had their way, though the tug of war has been wending its way through the court system thanks to a lawsuit the car companies slapped on the states wanting cleaner, greener vehicles. (For more, see my earlier post and this New York Times article.)
| The U.S. vs. the World | |
|---|---|
| Fuel Economy Standards (in miles per gallon) Mandated by 2016 or Earlier* | |
| The president's fuel economy goal is not chump change by any stretch. But how ambitious is it on a global scale? Let’s look at how it stacks up against other countries. |
|
| European Union: |
48 |
| Japan: | 47 |
| China (averaged)**: | 36 |
| United States (proposed): | 35.5 |
| United States (current): | 27.5 |
All that changes today with the president’s announcement of the nation’s first greenhouse gas emissions standards for cars along with more stringent fuel economy standards. Faced with the alternative of having to deal with two sets of standards — one for the federal Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) and the other for California’s global warming standards — the automobile industry has agreed to support Obama’s plan.
Under the new standards, by 2016, cars and light trucks sold in the United States will have to:
- emit on average 30 percent less greenhouse gases than the current fleet and
- meet a combined average CAFE standard of 35.5 miles per gallon (up from the current standard of 27.5 mpg for cars and 23.1 mpg for light trucks).
And all that will put us on a faster track for better fuel economy — four years ahead of what the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 requires.
This is a significant step for America. The new regulation will:
- save an estimated 1.4 billion barrels of oil per year once the entire fleet turns over to the new standard; that’s a little more than 25 percent of our current annual oil consumption (by comparison, opening up the remaining outer continental shelf and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling would only increase our domestic oil supply by 350 million barrels per year during peak production);
- lower U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by the equivalent of shutting down almost 200 (or roughly 30-40 percent of) coal-fired power plants by the mid-2020s.
Notes
* Data represent fuel economy normalized to the U.S. mandated test cycle used to calculate the CAFE as reported by the International Council on Clean Transportation. (Source: Passenger Vehicle Greenhouse Gas and Fuel Economy Standards: A Global Update [pdf].)
** China's fuel economy standards are rated between 21 and 43 mpg, depending on vehicle class.
Cost/Benefit?