That's provided Senator Clinton gets elected president. No, no. Just kidding. (I think). According to the Detroit News, "The U.S. Transportation Department today will propose a sweeping increase in fuel economy standards, requiring passenger cars to average 35.7 miles per gallon and light trucks 28.6 mpg by 2015." That's average folks. So for every 14mpg non-hybrid Escalade (should such things exist) that GM sells (should such a thing exist), they'll have to sell a light truck that achieves 42.2mpg. Maybe. But first, the hype. "Transportation Secretary Mary Peters will unveil the proposed regulation at an Earth Day event in McLean, Va., at a Federal Highway Research facility. Peters will make the announcement against a backdrop of vehicles from the large automakers, including Detroit's Big Three. A source who saw her prepared remarks said Peters plans to call the proposal 'ambitious but achievable.'" So, a nice photo op and some props for a lame duck Prez, then. But here's the real deal: "The proposal also reforms the way fuel economy numbers are set for passenger cars. Instead of one overall number, the proposal sets a series of requirements based on the size, or attributes of the car. It's not clear how the attributes will be defined or how the system will differ from a similar reform of light truck fuel rules in 2006."
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Out of interest I wonder what figures the European market currently achieves.
I can’t wait for the government to assign vehicle attributes vis-a-vis fuel standards, they’ll do a stellar job. Will color be an attribute too? Darker colors incurring a penalty because they are more reflective and increase global warning?
A gas tax increase will accomplish the same thing with less paperwork. Our Treasury needs the money too…
The Fuel Economy math is wrong – you have to turn MPGs into consumption (gallons/per mile) to come up with an average for a fleet. So if you sold one vehicle at 14 MPGs, you theoretically cannot get to an average of 28 mpgs, since you have already consumed all of the gas of that two vehicle fleet….
An example: if you had a truck at 14mpg and one truck at 20 mpg, your average would be 2/((1/14)+(1/20))=16.5 MPG, not 17.0.
What this means is that it will be even harder to make up for any low fuel economy entries in your fleet….
Mikey, good point. Is that the way the CAFE calculation works, or do they just average the fleet’s mpg?
What’s the possible sense behind separate averages for cars and SUVs? A gallon of fuel burned is a gallon of fuel less for everyone. Is this supposed to be a protectionist measure for truck-intensive domestic manufacturers, and regulators expect that imbalance to persist through 2015? Something to do with the inherent superiority of people who tow things?
Besides, what is an SUV? Apparently a Chev HHR is but a Kia Rondo isn’t. WTF?
brownie- Yes that is the way it is calculated. It would be a lot easier if they used a fuel consumption metric like Europe (liters/100km), which makes the math easier, but mpg is too well-known to change now.
Also, every automaker will get the same footprint-based curves. This means that automakers’ portfolios who are more heavily weighted towards smaller vehicles will have to meet a higher composite CAFE target than the others.
Conversely, OEMs who have larger-then-average vehicle (in aggregate), will have a slightly lower composite target.
Demanding unobtainable fuel mileage standards is a win-win situation for the government. In one hand you have the appearance of eco-friendliness, and in the other you have back-door corporate taxes in the form of penalties.
Wow, same thing will happen. People will just buy into the CAFE class that allows them to get the power and size they want.
Good. If it was one overall number, we’d really be screwed. By classing this, the govt is reducing its usefulness. They should just get rid of the stupid CAFE anyway.
Look how quickly high fuel prices have changed buying habits. The proof is in the pudding. Fuel price will do more than CAFE ever will.
You also have to remember that CAFE “mileage” is not the same as fuel economy. The Escalade averages 15 mpgs, I think, according to fuel economy standards. But it gets like 19 mpg when measured by CAFE. Ford’s overall mileage for their fleet was 18.7 mpg last year, dragged down by the F-series, which made up nearly 30% of Ford’s sales. Their CAFE was just over 24.
And I fully agree that gas prices, not CAFE, are an effective way to change consumer behavior. That’s why I’d rather see gas taxes hiked than CAFE implemented. At least with gas taxes (imagine a $1.50-$2.00 gas tax phased in over the next 12 years), gas prices are high enough to prevent price shocks most of the time, limiting medium-term economic risk. European prices are high now, but they are only up 40% the last three years… we’re up 200+%, so the effect on our economy is much worse. Consumers would also still have all their choices – they’d just have to be able to afford driving their choice. But that’s what economics is!!
Does this mean we will get light trucks with small hp, high torque engines that many of us really want?
If so, I guess there will be a silver lining to this pile of …
Right on RobertSD and Mikey610. Besides, higher prices for fuel might actually result in more fun in a car. If you take a powerful car and accelerate hard in a straight line for 10 seconds you’ll be sent directly to jail for reckless endangerment. What is the fun of that? You can have a lot more fun on public streets with a light car and 125 horsepower.
As far as fuel economy in foreign countries, here’s a pdf that has some information.
http://pdf.wri.org/automobile-fuel-economy-co2-industrialized-countries.pdf
Summary of the pdf…
Current cars and private light truck fleet on the road in 2005: 20 MPG in USA, 29 in Germany, 34 in Italy, 31 in France, 30 in UK
New vehicles sold in 2005: 24 MPG in USA, 31 in UK, 34 in Germany, 37 in France.
I’d take the New Vehicle figures with a larger grain of salt than the fleet ones. The France figure is labeled as “gasoline equivalent,” which brings into question several variables about equating diesel and gasoline.
Another area of the paper talks about vehicle weight. (Mass actually, as the paper uses kilograms.) These are probably pretty accurate. 2004 US car average weight: 3500 pounds. US “light” truck weight: 4600 pounds. Europen average: 2900 pounds (I think cars and trucks are rolled together).
Horsepower average figures: 2004 EU horsepower is 110, 2004 USA car horsepower is 180, 2004 USA light truck horsepower is 320 (!!!). US car for 2005 moved up to 195.
Bare in mind also that the USA CAFE is set at 28 MPG but we are actually at about 24 MPG in vehicle sales. So, if CAFE is set to 35 we could expect perhaps 30 MPG real-world, which is quite a bit behind where Europe is right now.
agreed on the gas tax.
25 cents per gallon (per year) increase for the next 10 years…
a ‘nice slow phase’…
or, just stick it to consumers and slap on a 3$ /gallon gas tax starting Jan 1 2009!
Sooner or later the freedom of mobility we all take for granted will be restricted. England is working on it now, making it so expensive to drive people have to change their lifestyles around getting from some place to live to a job so they can survive.
Maybe if companies build dorms and quarter their workers on the site. Oh wait, that is being done in China already.
25mpg is doable for Light Trucks. If you dropped a 2.5.-3L diesel into the Ranger or Colorado/Canyon you could easily do 28-34mpg.
Heck my jeep with a not that efficient 4WD drive train manages 23-25.
I concur with Sunnyvale that the fleet has gotten bloated in the past decade.
$4/gal gas should start to trim the fat.
Switching to lightweight, fuel-sipping vehicles won’t be so bad. Think of how much fun commuting will be in one of these economy cars:
http://www.gokarts.net/productDetail.php?ID=4
I agree with RobertSD. Raise gas taxes and forget about CAFE. Eliminating CAFE will eliminate the games car makers play with fleet gas mileage. If the car makers can find the customers willing to pay the price to fill up their gas hogs, more power to them. And if I want a Hummer and am willing to pay the price at the pump, I should be able to do that as well.
And I fully agree that gas prices, not CAFE, are an effective way to change consumer behavior. That’s why I’d rather see gas taxes hiked than CAFE implemented…
Actually I’d rather see registration surcharges for less efficient vehicles. A universal tax whacks those who drive efficient vehicles. In most parts of the country you drive or you stay home. 150 MPG is a pipe dream, but high goals force people to innovate. The historical record of the industry is quite clear. Unless forced by regulation or strong consumer demand, nothing changes. The typical “we can’t do this” is what you hear every time a new standard is proposed. Yes, you can’t achieve 150 mpg but you can do better than we have been.
Besides, what is an SUV? Apparently a Chev HHR is but a Kia Rondo isn’t. WTF?
Same goes for a Subaru Outback or a PT Cruiser. This is simply the automakers gaming the regulations for calculating mileage. These vehicles get decent mileage and by averaging them in with the guzzlers, it helps offset the poor mileage of the big trucks. Because of removable seats and other items, these vehicles can be classified as trucks even though they aren’t.
You know, it’s actually going to be enjoyable seeing you “tax em outa their SUVs” communists sitting in your little worker housing cubicles eating soylent green… until you no longer serve any purpose and they just euthanize ya. You’ll have earned it.
Golden2husky,
The problem with registration taxes is that they punish those who use less fuel in their guzzlers, like me, while rewarding 50k a year drivers of small cars.
Furthermore, it puts in a disincentive for owners to upgrade their vehicles. Especially fleets. If you tax older vehicles based on fuel mileage you will outrage the poor, and mostly cause an increase in fuel consumption!
What happens is that people who own a truck for weekend use only either sell it, or the other vehicle that replaces it during the week. They increase their fuel burn, but save money on the registration fees and taxes. If they sell the occasional use truck, it will likely go to someone who will now use it daily. Without the incentives created by the new tax, that person may have been more likely to buy a newer, more efficient vehicle.
If you want to use taxes to modify fuel use behavior, the only way that makes sense is fuel taxes. If you want to raise those, then lower some others. Good luck with the latter.