EPA introduces first CO2 limits for cars

The Obama administration has announced the first-ever greenhouse-gas emissions limits for cars. The limits, a joint rule by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Transportation (DOT), will require cars to average 35.5 mpg by 2016, four years earlier than under previous fuel economy requirements.

The new rule ends years of legal battles between automakers, the federal government, and California. The Golden State had been trying to implement its own greenhouse-gas emissions rules, which would have required cars to get 37.5 mpg by 2020. Automakers and California have agreed to the standard and the state has agreed not to implement its own, more stringent standards before 2016, according to a senior Obama administration official.

“We look forward to getting the waiver we’ve asked for that will allow us to get our program for 2009, ’10, and ’11," said Stanley Young, a spokesperson for the California Air Resources Board. "For 2012 through 2016, we have agreed to accept the federal standard as equivalent to the California standard. The early years for our program have a very gentle ramp in, so most if not all the models currently for sale in California meet the standards for the first year, that is, 2009.”

Limiting greenhouse gas emissions, primarily carbon dioxide, effectively requires cars to get better fuel economy. CO2 is a natural byproduct of burning fossil fuels, and there is no technology to filter it out or chemically treat it.

The new standards will essentially require cars to get 39 mpg in 2016, and SUVs, pickups, and minivans to get 30 mpg.

The federal government has raised fuel economy standards for the 2011 to 2015 time frame twice in the past two years, but neither requirement has been implemented.

The new standards will raise fuel economy even faster than either of those two earlier provisions. Individual automakers will still have individual fuel economy targets, as will certain sizes of vehicles. Like the previous regulations, the new standards are based on the size of the vehicle’s footprint in an effort to force automakers to apply fuel-saving technologies to all their models. (The footprint is the area between the wheels of the car.) Several automakers have told us they couldn’t meet the last increase in fuel economy standards without introducing large numbers of electric cars. We expect these CO2 limits will only accelerate electric-car introductions.

—Eric Evarts

Learn about driving green in the Consumer Reports special fuel economy section.

Updated 5/19/09.

Comments

[Cale]

Long overdue. Now back to drooling over the latest muscle cars...

[Joe]

But will people buy the cars the automakers are force to make?