Today, President Donald Trump will call for a review of fuel economy and tailpipe pollution standards for light-duty vehicles in model years 2022 to 2025.
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The good news is that clean auto standards will reduce air pollution and will reduce climate pollution by 6 billion metric tons over the lifetimes of the vehicles sold in model years 2012-25 – the equivalent of carbon pollution from 150 typical coal-fired power plants for an entire year. “If the standards threatened auto jobs, then common sense changes could’ve and should’ve been made”, he said.
“Letting auto manufacturers off the hook is going to make it more expensive to fuel up at the pump and there also will be a big climate cost, ” said Doug O’Malley, director of Environment New Jersey.
Trump announced a decision to reinstate a review of fuel efficiency standards negotiated by President Obama.
The decision will give auto manufacturers another opportunity to relax the Obama administration’s standards adopted by the U.S. Environmental Protection in January, which opponents said would be hard to meet. “There was a lot of data that was submitted, and I think it is fair to say the Obama EPA just ignored it”.
President Trump touted “a new industrial revolution” and “cancelled” one of his predecessor’s last moves – stricter environmental standards for motor vehicles – in a speech Wednesday in MI. It’s not as if we didn’t know this was going to happen, though. “If left unchanged, those standards could cause up to 1.1 million Americans to lose jobs due to lost vehicle sales”. The administration has made no decisions on how or if the standards should be revised, the official said. The reconsideration of the stringent CAFE standards is taking place at the request of American automakers who
American drivers are also set to lose out, with the Obama rules forecast to save an average of $8,000 on gasoline costs for a new vehicle.
The Trump administration is undoing an essentially meaningless move by the Obama administration, said Jeff Holmstead, a partner at Bracewell LLC and an assistant EPA administrator under former President George W. Bush.
Environmental and consumer groups have countered that, so far, increasing fuel efficiency has not increased vehicle prices, and that reducing fuel economy standards could cost consumers thousands if gas prices spike upward again as they have in the past. The Trump administration’s review should lead to a redoubling of the nation’s commitment to pursuing those benefits.
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Federal and California tailpipe standards have helped spur tremendous progress in electric and hybrid vehicles in recent years, with cars coming onto the market that can drive farther on a tank of gas or a single charge-up.
