From the main article (the PDF): It's undated, so I don't know how old it is or how much regulations have changed since then.
From the main article (the PDF):
A key feature in the current U.S. fuel economy standards is its “footprint-based” fuel economy targets. Vehicle footprint is de!ned by the rectangle formed by a car’s wheelbase and track width. As shown in Figure 2, the CAFE standards allow larger cars to have lower fuel economy targets and require smaller cars to have more stringent fuel economy targets.
For example, to meet the 2012 targets, the smallest vehicles needed to achieve an average fuel economy of about 36 mpg, while the largest vehicles were required to average just 28 mpg. By 2025, the smallest vehicles would need to reach nearly 62 mpg. The largest cars, in contrast, would only need to reach 46 mpg.
Automakers need to meet the fuel economy targets by fleet average. Therefore, under this regulation, automakers that sell larger cars are faced with less stringent fuel economy targets, while automakers that sell smaller cars are faced with more stringent fuel economy targets.
This type of regulation is called “attribute-based regulation” because the stringency of the regulation (in this case, the fuel economy targets) depends on an attribute of products (in this case, the vehicle footprint of a car). These enormous differences in the fuel economy target create a perverse incentive for automakers, encouraging them to increase the manufacture and sales of larger vehicles in order to make the environmental regulation easier to meet. This is an unintended consequence for a policy designed to reduce fuel consumption because making cars bigger leads to poorer fuel economy.
It's undated, so I don't know how old it is or how much regulations have changed since then.
The web scraper says CAFE is essentially dead as of Trump's 2nd term, because violating it doesn't result in fines and thus there's no point in obeying it in for-profit car companies. They'll...
The web scraper says
Published May 14 2018
CAFE is essentially dead as of Trump's 2nd term, because violating it doesn't result in fines and thus there's no point in obeying it in for-profit car companies. They'll still obey some regulations though, because they need to obey California regs to sell in California, and making two versions of everything to skirt regs costs more money than it saves.
I'd argue this cart is leading the horse. US car companies were already failing at engineering competitive vehicles, both on weight and fuel economy fronts, and were having their lunch eaten by...
These enormous differences in the fuel economy target create a perverse incentive for automakers, encouraging them to increase the manufacture and sales of larger vehicles in order to make the environmental regulation easier to meet.
I'd argue this cart is leading the horse. US car companies were already failing at engineering competitive vehicles, both on weight and fuel economy fronts, and were having their lunch eaten by Japanese brands for decades. So they lobbied for a standard that would reward their heavy garbage and aggressively penalize Japanese and European vehicles. Then they manufacture consent with advertising, plastering SUVs everywhere in media.
I feel like changing the incentive structure to make it less desirable for consumers to even purchase large footprint vehicles would fix a lot of other issues. Large vehicles cause a lot of other...
I feel like changing the incentive structure to make it less desirable for consumers to even purchase large footprint vehicles would fix a lot of other issues. Large vehicles cause a lot of other issues with safety and road wear, so incentivizing smaller vehicle purchases and sales would lower fuel consumption and improve other safety metrics across the board.
Comment box Scope: comment response, information, opinion Tone: neutral Opinion: yes Sarcasm/humor: none Many states have a weight-based vehicle registration fee for at least some categories of...
Comment box
Scope: comment response, information, opinion
Tone: neutral
Opinion: yes
Sarcasm/humor: none
Many states have a weight-based vehicle registration fee for at least some categories of vehicles, but it does not scale proportionally with the overall damage to infrastructure, environment and society that large vehicles cause.
Proportionally scaled registration fees would functionally eliminate the sale of large vehicles, as long as the baseline fees were also raised. If not, they would help, but not eliminate the problem.
For example in PA a 6,000 lb truck has a $111 fee while a 60,000 lb truck has a $1,739.00 fee. The fee increases at a higher rate for even heavier vehicles. This is a very small incentive to own a lighter vehicle, and you occasionally see people trying to register their 7500 lb truck as 6500 lb to save $103. For this to be effective, the state would have to raise the fees on all truck registrations and make the slope of fee increases steeper than it already is. They might need to add additional weight registration fees for smaller vehicles too?
All of this would be politically unpopular in any municipality where a plurality of people drive light trucks or SUVs. Even with exemptions for commercial uses/people who actually 'need' trucks, it would still be unpopular. It would be more feasible in urban centers, but giving local municipalities the ability to levy their own fees on top of DOT fees would probably require legislation from the state government, which would be a challenge in most states.
I think one of the most important changes that doesn't require anything other than changing standards is moving from a "distance per volume" to a "volume per distance" standard for measuring fuel...
I think one of the most important changes that doesn't require anything other than changing standards is moving from a "distance per volume" to a "volume per distance" standard for measuring fuel economy stated to consumers.
That would change behavior and purchasing patterns significantly, which is why it's resisted in the US oil companies.
Yes, numbers in miles per gallon or kilometers per liters is easier for estimating the range of your vehicle. But your vehicle already does that and gives you that number constantly updated simply as "range: ____ km/miles". It's not a needed number.
For emissions tracking or comparing fuel consumption, galons per 100 miles or liters per 100 km is a much better measure:
It's trivial to recognize how a light truck's fuel consumption (say 5 gallons per 100 miles) compares to a heavy semi that averages 17 gallons per 100 miles. This number also reflects that we're talking averages based on varied driving conditions, speed, congestion etc. and that the values in a single moment aren't important other than seeing that yes, hitting the throttle or brake consumes way more fuels than not pedaling to change driver behavior to efficient, but still safe ways of driving economically.
The idea is that smaller is better when we're talking about burning gas. You can get closer to zero gas used, but it gets harder. For example, 2 gallons per hundred miles is twice as good as 4...
The idea is that smaller is better when we're talking about burning gas. You can get closer to zero gas used, but it gets harder.
For example, 2 gallons per hundred miles is twice as good as 4 gallons per hundred (going from 25 mpg to 50). Going from 2 gallons to 1 gallon (from 50 to 100 mpg) is both very hard and would only save one more gallon. At that point, going electric is easier.
It also makes the gas guzzlers stand out more. Something like a Ford Mustang Shelby burns over 7 gallons per hundred miles.
I used round numbers, but yes, in practice there would be decimals. (Or make it per thousand miles to make all the numbers look bigger.)
I'm doubtful that it would make all that much difference. But any ratio can be just as easily described either way (miles per gallon or gallons per mile) and multiplying by 100 or 1000 just moves...
I'm doubtful that it would make all that much difference. But any ratio can be just as easily described either way (miles per gallon or gallons per mile) and multiplying by 100 or 1000 just moves the decimal point. So I don't get the hate. You seem to think one way is more confusing than the other and I don't really see why, once people got used to it.
From the main article (the PDF):
It's undated, so I don't know how old it is or how much regulations have changed since then.
The web scraper says
CAFE is essentially dead as of Trump's 2nd term, because violating it doesn't result in fines and thus there's no point in obeying it in for-profit car companies. They'll still obey some regulations though, because they need to obey California regs to sell in California, and making two versions of everything to skirt regs costs more money than it saves.
Isn’t there a push to strip California of its ability to set regulations like this?
A planned push, but it hasn't succeeded yet AFAIK.
Things like this are so two faced. Where are muh states rights that republicans say they want ?
I'd argue this cart is leading the horse. US car companies were already failing at engineering competitive vehicles, both on weight and fuel economy fronts, and were having their lunch eaten by Japanese brands for decades. So they lobbied for a standard that would reward their heavy garbage and aggressively penalize Japanese and European vehicles. Then they manufacture consent with advertising, plastering SUVs everywhere in media.
I feel like changing the incentive structure to make it less desirable for consumers to even purchase large footprint vehicles would fix a lot of other issues. Large vehicles cause a lot of other issues with safety and road wear, so incentivizing smaller vehicle purchases and sales would lower fuel consumption and improve other safety metrics across the board.
Comment box
Many states have a weight-based vehicle registration fee for at least some categories of vehicles, but it does not scale proportionally with the overall damage to infrastructure, environment and society that large vehicles cause.
Proportionally scaled registration fees would functionally eliminate the sale of large vehicles, as long as the baseline fees were also raised. If not, they would help, but not eliminate the problem.
For example in PA a 6,000 lb truck has a $111 fee while a 60,000 lb truck has a $1,739.00 fee. The fee increases at a higher rate for even heavier vehicles. This is a very small incentive to own a lighter vehicle, and you occasionally see people trying to register their 7500 lb truck as 6500 lb to save $103. For this to be effective, the state would have to raise the fees on all truck registrations and make the slope of fee increases steeper than it already is. They might need to add additional weight registration fees for smaller vehicles too?
All of this would be politically unpopular in any municipality where a plurality of people drive light trucks or SUVs. Even with exemptions for commercial uses/people who actually 'need' trucks, it would still be unpopular. It would be more feasible in urban centers, but giving local municipalities the ability to levy their own fees on top of DOT fees would probably require legislation from the state government, which would be a challenge in most states.
I think one of the most important changes that doesn't require anything other than changing standards is moving from a "distance per volume" to a "volume per distance" standard for measuring fuel economy stated to consumers.
That would change behavior and purchasing patterns significantly, which is why it's resisted in the US oil companies.
Yes, numbers in miles per gallon or kilometers per liters is easier for estimating the range of your vehicle. But your vehicle already does that and gives you that number constantly updated simply as "range: ____ km/miles". It's not a needed number.
For emissions tracking or comparing fuel consumption, galons per 100 miles or liters per 100 km is a much better measure:
It's trivial to recognize how a light truck's fuel consumption (say 5 gallons per 100 miles) compares to a heavy semi that averages 17 gallons per 100 miles. This number also reflects that we're talking averages based on varied driving conditions, speed, congestion etc. and that the values in a single moment aren't important other than seeing that yes, hitting the throttle or brake consumes way more fuels than not pedaling to change driver behavior to efficient, but still safe ways of driving economically.
The idea is that smaller is better when we're talking about burning gas. You can get closer to zero gas used, but it gets harder.
For example, 2 gallons per hundred miles is twice as good as 4 gallons per hundred (going from 25 mpg to 50). Going from 2 gallons to 1 gallon (from 50 to 100 mpg) is both very hard and would only save one more gallon. At that point, going electric is easier.
It also makes the gas guzzlers stand out more. Something like a Ford Mustang Shelby burns over 7 gallons per hundred miles.
I used round numbers, but yes, in practice there would be decimals. (Or make it per thousand miles to make all the numbers look bigger.)
I'm doubtful that it would make all that much difference. But any ratio can be just as easily described either way (miles per gallon or gallons per mile) and multiplying by 100 or 1000 just moves the decimal point. So I don't get the hate. You seem to think one way is more confusing than the other and I don't really see why, once people got used to it.
I like L/100km better than the other way, but how would this actually make a difference? Is it just a consumer perception thing?
It's entirely about consumer perception.
Why are we still talking about cars which run on dinosaur poop in the first place?