“…The Trump administration has finally come out with its proposal to reverse Obama-era regulations on vehicle emissions. This is welcome, for current standards make cars unnecessarily expensive and limit choices while producing scant environmental benefit.
The Environmental Protection Agency and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which jointly administer the CAFE (corporate average fuel economy) program, unveiled eight options for fuel-economy standards for vehicles made between 2021 and 2026. Of those, the agencies recommend freezing standards at 2020 levels through 2026 as the best option.
If accepted, this would block mandatory yearly increases, which were ordered under Obama. The practical outcome will be to save car buyers about $2,340 per new vehicle, according to the administration. A separate 2016 study found that Obama’s fuel regulations had already cost consumers at least $3,800 per car for the 2016 model year.Mueller’s midterm electionsWatch Full Screen to Skip Ads
That higher price stymies some people who want to buy new, safer cars and thus forces manufacturers to make cars that buyers can’t afford and don’t want.
Instead of meeting a 54-mile-per-gallon standard by 2025, cars and light trucks would instead have to hit only 43.7 miles per gallon, the established 2020 level. This number is theoretical, however, and the real average number would be 30 miles per gallon under the new proposal, compared to 36 under Obama.
The Department of Transportation estimates that the new regulations will increase carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by only eight one-hundredths of a percent in the year 2100, and an average extra warming of only three-thousandths of a degree Celsius. That won’t save the planet…”
