New CAFE Standards and the Effort to Drive Americans Toward EVs

Mark Green
Posted June 13, 2024

If Americans feel like Big Government is actively working to herd them into buying electric vehicles (EVs) in coming years, they’re not wrong. That’s clearly the purpose in Biden administration regulatory actions that basically set the marketplace by forcing automakers to produce more EVs.

First, EPA’s tailpipe emissions rule amounts to a de facto ban on new sales of gasoline-fueled vehicles and traditional hybrids from model year 2027 to 2032. Second, like the tailpipe rule, the government’s new fuel economy standards for gasoline vehicles also will benefit EVs in the years ahead.

The administration legally doesn’t have the authority to ban gasoline vehicles, but it is using these regulations to do just that. Administration officials seem to want a future with more EVs and fewer gasoline vehicles – with those vehicles too expensive for many Americans to afford. It’s like a scene from the 2011 film “Moneyball,” where a baseball team’s general manager trades away the head coach’s favorite players, leaving only the GM’s chosen players to fill out the lineup card.

Bottom line: Washington is coming for the cars and trucks you drive via regulation that effectively takes away your freedom to select the new vehicle that best suits your needs and budget. At the same time, it is discouraging innovation in liquid fuels and higher efficiency gasoline engines that could help reduce emissions more quickly and economically.

Will Hupman, API vice president for Downstream Policy, reacted to the new Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards issued last week by the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA):

“We are deeply concerned by NHTSA’s final rule released today. Once again, the Biden administration has acted to restrict Americans’ freedom to decide what vehicle fits their needs and budget. Combined with EPA’s recently finalized tailpipe emissions standards, these rules amount to a de facto ban by the administration on the sale of new cars and trucks using liquid fuels, which can and should be a part of the solution as we look to reduce carbon emissions. We urge Congress to step in to preserve Americans’ access to affordable, reliable, and efficient transportation.”

CAFE’s requirement that vehicle manufacturers achieve an average above 51-plus miles per gallon across their fleets will be a steep hill to climb for any gasoline vehicle larger than a thimble, as one commentator put it. SUVs and other large models are likely to disappear as automakers concentrate on smaller, lighter vehicles to meet the mileage standard. Let’s see, how many people and their suitcases will be able to fit in the smaller vehicles of the future?

Americans should be concerned with the Biden administration’s attempt to set the vehicle marketplace of the future. Behind flowery public statements, Washington is picking engine technology winners and losers – EVs over cars and trucks that are powered by liquid fuels, an existing fleet of 270 million. Again, this discourages developing other technologies that can reduce emissions in those vehicles faster and at a lower cost.

U.S. vehicle owners have enjoyed shopping from a wide selection of vehicles for a century – since autos first became available in different colors in the 1920s. But under these regulations, Americans will increasingly find their choice comes down to an EV … or an EV.

While EVs absolutely are part of a lower-carbon future, they aren’t the only emissions solution, and they do not fit the transportation needs of the vast majority of U.S. drivers. A poll earlier this year found 75% of American voters surveyed oppose government regulations that would ban new gasoline, diesel and hybrid vehicles – putting them at odds with EPA’s rule requiring nearly three out of four new sedans and medium-duty work vans to be EVs or plug-in hybrid EVs by 2032, as well as two-thirds of SUVs and light-duty pickups.

Meanwhile, the U.S. will become more dependent on China, which produces and processes the majority of critical minerals needed to manufacture EV batteries. That’s a national security issue.

There’s another way. Washington policy to address greenhouse gas emissions should be technology-neutral. It should take a holistic, all-of-the-above approach to fuels, vehicles and infrastructure systems – and continue to respect Americans’ time-honored right to decide what they drive.