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Transportation United States

Trump Administration, In Biggest Environmental Rollback, To Announce Auto Pollution Rules (nytimes.com) 279

Posted by BeauHD from the erasing-Obama's-legacy dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: The Trump administration is expected on Tuesday to announce its final rule to roll back Obama-era automobile fuel efficiency standards, relaxing efforts to limit climate-warming tailpipe pollution and virtually undoing the government's biggest effort to combat climate change. The new rule, written by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Transportation, would allow vehicles on American roads to emit nearly a billion tons more carbon dioxide over the lifetime of the cars than they would have under the Obama standards and hundreds of millions of tons more than will be emitted under standards being implemented in Europe and Asia.

Trump administration officials have raced to complete the auto rule by this spring, even as the White House is consumed with responding to the coronavirus crisis. President Trump is expected to extol the rule, which will stand as one of the most consequential regulatory rollbacks of his administration, as a needed salve for an economy crippled by the pandemic. [...] The new rule, which is expected to be implemented by late spring, will roll back a 2012 rule that required automakers' fleets to average about 54 miles per gallon by 2025. Instead, the fleets would have to average about 40 miles per gallon. To meet the new number, fuel economy standards would have to rise by about 1.5 percent a year, compared to the 5 percent annual increase required by the Obama rule. The industry has said it would increase fuel economy standards by about 2.4 percent a year without any regulation. The new standard would lead to nearly a billion more tons of planet-warming carbon dioxide released and the consumption of about 80 billion more gallons of gasoline over the lifetime of the vehicles built during the terms of the rule, according to a recent draft of the plan. The report says about 20 states are expect to sue the Trump administration to undo the rule in a case expected to be resolved by the Supreme Court in the coming years.
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Trump Administration, In Biggest Environmental Rollback, To Announce Auto Pollution Rules More

Trump Administration, In Biggest Environmental Rollback, To Announce Auto Pollution Rules

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  • Just symbolic (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Berkyjay ( 1225604 ) on Monday March 30, 2020 @06:21PM (#59890188)

    Automakers won't even bother to read this as they know the next administration is going to reverse this as one of their first actions in office.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by leonbev ( 111395 )

      Yeah, auto manufacturers can't really react that quickly. Unless we get 4 more years of the Trump administration, don't expect the SUX 9000 to be released anytime soon.

    • The DNC is nominating child sniffer with _dementia_. Trump could basically shut down his campaign at this point and he'd still win in a landslide.

    • Automakers won't even bother to read this as they know the next administration is going to reverse this as one of their first actions in office.

      And let's face it, if they want to keep selling cars anywhere other than America they will need to develop more efficient engines anyway.

  • VW (Score:3)

    by lazarus ( 2879 ) on Monday March 30, 2020 @06:22PM (#59890196) Journal

    Are you going to give VW their money back?

    • Can I have one of those diesel VW's they seized now?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dex22 ( 239643 )

        I have one. Since they "fixed" it, it gets 32mpg instead of 41mpg actual. I'm more worried about CO2 and am happy to burn 3x more DEF to keep the other emissions down. DEF is cheap. Give me back my power and economy.

    • Where giving EVERYONE their money back, particularly the (for legal purposes) folks we didn't take it from in the first place.

  • Like whatever... Easy come, easy go (Score:3, Insightful)

    by fustakrakich ( 1673220 ) on Monday March 30, 2020 @06:29PM (#59890234) Journal

    That's the nature of the executive order. Very whimsical.

    If you want effective rules, congress has to write a law.

  • The Assholishness is the point (Score:5, Insightful)

    by AlanObject ( 3603453 ) on Monday March 30, 2020 @06:42PM (#59890282)

    Many consumers -- and Trump -- seem to think that GM develops their 2020 models in late 2019. No -- just a new drive train can take 5 years to get from concept to production. Other parts might take less time but it is expensive to change them just on a whim.

    So the vast bulk of R&D over the past several years was all assuming that they Obama-era limits were going to be in place. This "gift" from Trump is no gift at all unless they want to scrap their R&D over the past 5 years or so.

    They aren't going to do that because what they have been working on is better than what they would have had to offer otherwise. This is true of both ICE and EV plans. And some major auto-makers have the objective of all-EV anyway.

    So at the end of the day this is just a demonstration of how big an asshole Trump, McConnell, and all the cronies can be. An all-too-big segment of the voting public loves this about them. They stuck it to the libs once again and they ain't following no lib rules and that's what they want to see. It's a big f-u to anyone telling them what they can and can't do.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Nugoo ( 1794744 )

      So at the end of the day this is just a demonstration of how big an asshole Trump, McConnell, and all the cronies can be.

      In other words, vice signalling.

    • Mileage regulations affect car prices. It's happened in the past in the US. People usually want nicer cars than the ones that get high mileage. To get a high corporate average fuel economy, manufacturers have to sell lots of econoboxes that people don't want. To sell the econoboxes, prices have to be set very low, often below the cost of production. They have to make their money back, and they do it by charging more for luxury cars, trucks, and whatever else they can.
    • Really? Because from the article it looks to me like all that R&D is yielding a 2.4% increase per year.

      Mandating 1.5% doesn't mean manufacturers won't go over, it means they won't be punished if they can't do better. Mandating 5% may just mean they have to pay fines for failing to reach an impossible goal.

  • And how were we going to get to 54 MPG? (Score:4, Informative)

    by erp_consultant ( 2614861 ) on Monday March 30, 2020 @06:44PM (#59890300)

    The automaker response has been two fold - build small displacement gas engines and build electric cars.

    The small displacement gas engines are typically turbo charged and gasoline direct injection (GDI). I have to admit that turbos can be a hoot to drive but just know that as soon as that turbo kicks in the mpg goes way down. Drastically down. Like, worse than a V6 down. And since they are ramming all that turbo air into the engine block, creating much higher compression ratios, the engines simply won't last as long as normally aspirated engines do on average. The increased complexity also leads to higher repair bills. Remember those stories about the 2007 Lexus with the V6 that has 500,000 miles on it and it's still running like a clock? I'm betting that none of those little turbos will run that long. Not even close.

    GDI is an interesting technology and does use fuel more efficiently but it leads to a big problem - premature carbon build up on the inside of the engine. If that goes unchecked it will lead to premature engine failure. So on the gas front both of the solutions lead to shorter engine life and higher repair bills.

    I love the idea of electric cars but there are some real issues with it. For one, cobalt. Most lithium ion batteries use varying amounts of cobalt and last time I checked 60% of the world supply of cobalt comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo. Not exactly the most politically stable region in the world to say the least. Mining cobalt is an extremely dangerous practice both environmentally and from a direct human exposure standpoint. It basically contaminates everything it comes in contact with. Not to mention that much of the mining is done through exploitative child labor practices. So there's that too.

    The other concern I have is the impact on the electric grid. In the USA roughly 2% of all cars sold are 100% electric. What happens if that goes to 20% of all cars? Will the grid be able to withstand it? Not without some serious upgrades and I don't see anyone rushing out to do that.

    • Realistically, unless you make everyone drive a Toyota Prius or a worse tin can, then goal of 55MPG fleet economy is unattainable. Brand new car models, even compacts with tiny engines, are struggling to demonstrate fuel economy better than 35-40MPG.

      • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • I had a 1993 Tercel that did 38-40 mpg. It was a 2200 pound car. Drivetrain technology has improved since then, but whether 55 mpg is feasible without substantial sacrifices in cost, drivability, comfort, and reliability is an open question.
    • No problem, just get a gasoline-powered generator to charge it. Grid problem solved, everyone wins!

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by shilly ( 142940 )

        I know you were taking the piss, but the irony is that even that is better, because a generator runs at constant load tuned for efficiency cf an ICE which must respond to varying demands. That's how REX vehicles can get so far despite tiny gas tanks and small engines: the engine runs at constant load to replenish the batteries, which can cope much more efficiently with varying demand.

    • the engines simply won't last as long as normally aspirated engines do on average.

      What's gonna die first, the engines or the electronics? I've got a 2005 car, 3-4 months ago some electronics started going south. I'm looking at $2k to replace the computer I think is responsible (several things failed at the same time, the only common item is the computer). I could do it myself for about $300, but then my keyfob won't work anymore. If I want the keyfob to work I either pay the $2k, or buy a $2k doohicky to sync my keys to my new computer.

      What's really sad is right now I could buy a

      • Unless it is Lambo or Ferrari every 2005 car I have ever worked on the keys could be synced with a pretty generic scan tool and a couple of hours of time. You seem to be on a soapbox of your own creation.

    • GDI is an interesting technology and does use fuel more efficiently but it leads to a big problem - premature carbon build up on the inside of the engine.

      Wait, what? You should have stuck to the 5 or 6 claims you were most confident that you were repeating properly, because whatever you were trying to remember here you botched it. And if you understood the subject, you'd have caught whatever your mistake was.

      Now go and look up what GDI actually is, and see if what you said makes sense.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mishehu ( 712452 )
      Depends on how much the average car owner drives per day. Even with a standard single-phase 110vac circuit, if I drive 30 miles in a day, I have full charge on my Model 3 within about 6 hours. That's with it pulling about 12A of electricity, which is less than my HVAC pulls for my small 1-bedroom-1-bath house.

    • Re:And how were we going to get to 54 MPG? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by shilly ( 142940 ) on Tuesday March 31, 2020 @03:59AM (#59891588)

      1. Cobalt is used to desulphurize oil products. And that thing you typed your comment on has cobalt in it as well. So if now's the point at which you've found your conscience about child slavery in the DRC, you're a bit late to the party.
      2. Cobalt % in Li batteries for EVs is going down over time, partly due to supply chain risks. Chemistries are being improved continuously.
      3. The damage done by mining cobalt to the environment is absolutely dwarfed by the damage done by extracting oil (never mind actually burning the oil). Nothing to do with cobalt comes close to a Deepwater Horizon, for example.
      4. The additional grid load is nowhere near as much as you think it is, because people kid themselves about how much they drive. 37 miles per day per driver, on average, in the US. At 3mpkwh, that's 12kWh of electricity per day (3 is pretty low but I want to avoid over-claiming here). The average US household currently uses about 30kWh of electricity per day, mostly at times when EVs are not going to be charged, and you'll also be able to reduce the amount of crude oil you're refining which also saves electric power (about 1kWh per gallon, but obviously crude oil is still going to be refined for other products, it's a quantitative change not a binary on/off). So there's a material increase, of course, but it's on the order of 20 to 40% extra capacity per household that's required for a conversion to a 100% EV fleet, and just 5 to 10% extra capacity for a 20% EV fleet. US electricity usage per household increased by more than 20% in the 20 years from 1990 to 2010, so it's not like the industry is incapable of growth to meet new demand.

  • They're OK with it. They have Yachts,

  • 1 gigaton of extra carbon? That's such a drop in the bucket compared to where we are already.

    The "prevent climate change" ship sailed about a decade ago with barely anyone on it. We are so far beyond preventing AGW, it's simply unreasonable to discuss the possibility any more. AGW is gonna happen. Most or all of Earth's ice is gonna be gone. Every single climate region on the planet is going to fundamentally change. We've caused a mass extinction. None of this is going to slow down. Not for a long, lon
    • So..we should just shit the bed anyway? Pollute like hell, because we should just rely on pie-in-the-sky achievements such as adaptation and geo-engineering?

      No way. Diversification in all things. We need to stop shitting in the bed, too.

      This EPA rule-change is just a short-sighted unstable idiot, campaigning.
      • Oh, I agree with you. The EPA decision is idiotic. We should be reducing our pollution, not increasing it. We should be mitigating as much of the problem as we can. Yes, we *should* do as much as we can about it. However, the U.S. isn't on board with it. China isn't on board with it. India isn't on board with it. The EU is sort-of-lip-service on board with it. All the while, regardless of what people say, EVERYONE keeps cranking up the emission numbers.

        So, I'm being realistic here: the most likely outc
  • I guess it's better to rip off the Band Aid rather than pull it off slowly.

  • Of course, no one read or understands the rules (Score:4, Interesting)

    by magzteel ( 5013587 ) on Monday March 30, 2020 @07:40PM (#59890504)

    They are just upset because, you know, Orange Man Bad. Here, from Wikipedia, is what Volkswagen said when they refused to sign on:

    "Volkswagen responded to the July 29, 2011 agreement with the following statement: "Volkswagen does not endorse the proposal under discussion. It places an unfairly high burden on passenger cars, while allowing special compliance flexibility for heavier light trucks. Passenger cars would be required to achieve 5% annual improvements, and light trucks 3.5% annual improvements. The largest trucks carry almost no burden for the 2017–2020 timeframe, and are granted numerous ways to mathematically meet targets in the outlying years without significant real-world gains. The proposal encourages manufacturers and customers to shift toward larger, less efficient vehicles, defeating the goal of reduced greenhouse gas emissions."

    So maybe the rules could use some tweaking

    • You're missing the damage here. Trump tried to weight trucks because domestic manufacturers are making solid profits from them, and foreign manufacturers have to pay a tariff to get them into the country. So rather than "Orange man bad" -- take a moment and a breath and consider what will happen to all the jobs for domestic manufacturers like GM and Ford when they re-emphasize trucks and lose their entire market to new tech electrics from foreign manufacturers because they're selling last gen product. Oh,

    • So maybe the rules could use some tweaking

      Indeed, and a sane administration would raise the Truck rules, not lower the passenger car rules. Orange Man is Bad. I'm not sure why people here seem to think that's an insult to those who disagree with him.

      In any case we will just laugh from afar in amusement as Americans kill themselves while that very same Volkswagon goes about their business meeting the stricter emission standards set in other countries (clearly under threat of legal sanctions).

    • Re:Of course, no one read or understands the rules (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Can'tNot ( 5553824 ) on Tuesday March 31, 2020 @05:41AM (#59891724)

      So maybe the rules could use some tweaking

      That quote is saying that the law doesn't do enough to reduce greenhouse emissions. The "tweak" that Trump is pushing here eliminates any sort of greenhouse reduction at all. You've gotten this completely backwards.

  • What a legacy... (Score:3)

    by MiniMike ( 234881 ) on Monday March 30, 2020 @08:04PM (#59890584)

    President Trump is expected to extol the rule, which will stand as one of the most consequential regulatory rollbacks of his administration

    It's sad that, beyond the utterly inept handling of the current Corona virus pandemic, the the biggest part of the legacy Trump will leave behind is what he's undone. Most of which will probably be restored by the next administration.

  • Just like CHina, We could be seeing an increase in CO2. This is just plain stupid.
    The only goods about this, is he will kill so many Americans that we will very likely vote in Biden (which really means the VP). Hopefully, it is somebody like Amy klubachar and not warren or sanders. We need somebody that understands, 'ALL OF THE ABOVE', WRT Nuclear, Geothermal, hydro, wind and solar. Likewise, they will put on an intelligent carbon tax.

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