Obama wants increased fuel efficiency, less smog (not my title)

Did you know that to meet Euro 6 emissions standards some diesel cars are going to have to be fitted with a tank for storing a urea compound (AdBlue) which you'll have to get refilled at services? That's on top of the preheated delicate ceramic DPFs and cats.

Another method one company is looking at is a 1.2L 3 cylinder hybrid that kicks out 200bhp.

Yeah.... if it gets to that point, I'm not going to bother. I'm just going to go with a new motorcycle instead. At least that way I can use the HOV/carpool lanes and go more than 80mph. :p
 
Kat, you're right - it's like radioactivity or poison gas, if you can't see it, it can't hurt you.

Lets look at the government's own stats shall we? The site won't let me link so I have to use screenshots
SearchbyClassforFuelEfficientCar-1.png

SearchbyClassforFuelEfficientCars_1.png

Here are some common family boring things. In 03 they all had 2s and 3s on pollution, this years models all have 6s. For reference those retarded hybrids have 8s. So right now a full gasoline car is only slightly worse than a Prius. Technology will advance and they will get even more efficient. We do not need laws for this it's barely an issue.
 
http://jalopnik.com/5261242/no-automakers-meet-obamas-new-fuel-economy-standard

The just-announced fuel economy policy changes demand 39 MPG for cars and 30 MPG for light trucks. A look at the data shows not a single automaker currently meets the new guidelines proposed today. Update.

Using the Model-Year 2009 Fleet Fuel Economy standards provided by the National Highway Safety Transportation Administration (NHTSA), we determined the current ratings for passenger cars and light trucks and compared them to the goal for each of the major automakers selling cars in the U.S. A few automakers, like KIA and Hyundai, report their data separately because of a different ownership arrangement. We also took a look at what barriers exist for them reaching those standards.

UPDATE: The Obama Administration contacted us to tell us the originally reported numbers of 42 MPG for cars and 27 MPG for light trucks were wrong. Instead, they're requiring an average of 39 MPG for cars and 30 MPG for light trucks. We've made the proper adjustments but even with these different numbers no one meets either requirement.



BMW

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 27.5 MPG
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -11.5 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 23.1 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -6.9 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: BMW currently offers no hybrid or electric vehicles and, as a matter of practice, has been increasing displacement not decreasing it. The use of diesel engines is a step in the right direction but they're well behind where they need to be.




Chrysler

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 28.3 MPG
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -10.7 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 23.9 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -6.1 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Chrysler's biggest problem, in general, is the lack of appealing small cars with good fuel economy. Lacking any realistic vehicle on the horizon, the Chrysler-FIAT deal was envisioned to solve this issue. Let's see how that works out for them.




Daimler

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 27.5 MPG
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -11.5 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 20.6 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -9.4 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Mercedes-Benz may have to reconsider its policy of bringing over G-wagens and GL-wagens if it doesn't want to pay a fine, as the light truck numbers are low. The company has hinted at a smaller, possibly electric, model to bring up the average mileage but how many electric smarts do you need to outweigh an AMG G55?




Ford

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 31.1 MPG (excluding foreign import)
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -7.9 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 24.7 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -5.3 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Ford sells a lot of trucks. Despite fluctuations in fuel prices, the F-Series is bread + butter for the company. The addition of EcoBoost should help propel passenger vehicles to a higher overall value, and rumors of similar turbo'ed engines in the pickups should help as well.




GM

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 31.3 MPG (excluding foreign import)
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -7.7 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 22.5 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -7.5 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Barriers? What Barriers? The Volt will save everything... right? GM could be a victim of its own success if it turns out they start selling far more Camaros than hybrids and other fuel efficient vehicles.




Honda

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 36.5 MPG
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -2.5 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 26.2 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -3.8 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Honda typically ranks highest among brands, so they're doing pretty well. But maybe now we know why they keep delaying the NSX.




Hyundai

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 33.2 MPG
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -5.8 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 25.7 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -4.3 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Unlike most Asian brands, Hyundai has picked up steam by moving away from greener vehicles. WIll the Genesis sedan and coupe cut into the gains made by their dinky little Korean hatches?




Kia

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 33.7 MPG
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -5.3 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 24.4 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -5.6 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Kia has one big barrier to better fuel economy and it's the Kia Borrego. Since no one seems to want the $40K truck we don't see Kia having a hard time cutting it out of the lineup.




Mazda

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 32.2/31.0 MPG (Import/Domestic)
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -6.8 MPG/8.0 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 26.6 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -3.4 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: The only hybrid vehicle in the Mazda lineup is a rebadged Ford Escape and, so far as we know, diesel hasn't been considered an option. While the Mazda3 gets good mileage it's always placed Zoom-Zoom over glug-glug.




Mitsubishi

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 29.5 MPG
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -9.5 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 26.1 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -3.9 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: The one saving grace for Mitsubishi, as it languishes in the U.S., is the iMiev electric car. But can the company produce enough electrics and hold out long enough to make it economically feasible?




Nissan

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 30.1/34.0 MPG (Import/Domestic)
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -8.9 MPG/ 5.0 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 23.5 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -6.5 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Nissan has built a reputation around their VQ V6 and don't seem intent on taking it out of any of their vehicles. To balance this, they'll try to use the Nissan Cube and other small cars, but they'll have to do better than the also-ran Sentra




Porsche

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 27.0 MPG
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -12.0 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 19.3 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -10.7 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Porsche has historically been more content to pay fees than reform their ways given they're a performance brand. The profitable Cayenne, as well, presents a challenge. They could combine with VW to raise the Porsche average, but at the price of lowering VW's.




Subaru

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 29.0 MPG
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -10.0 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 28.4 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -1.6 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Subaru builds cars disproportionately more fun than you'd expect and the popularity of vehicles like the WRX and the lack of a small, under-powered economy car is a threat to the brand's overall mileage. Could we see the return of the Justy hatchback?




Suzuki

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 32.7 MPG
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -6.3 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 25.7 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -4.3 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: The current Suzuki lineup is so random and confusing it's hard to know where they could go. With the exception of the SX4 and Grand Vitara there aren't any products with much name recognition. Just scrap the whole thing and bring us the Cappuccino.




Toyota

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 38.1/35.9 MPG (Import/Domestic)
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -0.9 MPG/3.1 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 25.8 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -4.2 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Unless Toyota discontinues the Prius and decides to make the Tacoma V8-only, the automaker is moving in the right direction. Let's just hope this doesn't torpedo plans for a new Supra although we fear it might.




VW

2009 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 30.2 MPG
Distance From 2016 Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: -8.8 MPG
2009 Light Truck Fleet Fuel Economy Rating: 23.9 MPG
Distance From 2016 Light Truck Fuel Economy Rating: -6.1 MPG
Barriers To Meeting New Fuel Economy Ratings: Volkswagen's greatest environmental asset is the TDI engine. It's greatest weakness is the high price of diesel fuel and the possibility of Americans turning on their technology. The greatest barrier on the horizon is Porsche, so we can't imagine them combining.




Conclusion

Not a single automaker currently meets 2016 standards for fuel economy. In passenger cars, only Toyota and Honda, who have larger fleets of fuel-efficient cars are less than 10 MPG away from the proposed standards. This means companies will either have to radically alter their lineups, reduce the production of vehicles we actually want to drive, or invest heavily in alternative propulsion systems at a time when their capital is severely constrained. Good luck with that! Appliance vehicles, here we come!
 
This is fucking stupid. Need a truck to pull your trailer? Better get on a waiting list, we can only built 30 per year to meet our overall emissions standards!
 
Why do you need 40 MPG anyway. I get like 12 the way I drive and I don't care. I can still afford to go around.
 
Why do you need 40 MPG anyway. I get like 12 the way I drive and I don't care. I can still afford to go around.
It all ties into the ecomentalist movement; the less gas it uses per mile, the less emissions it has, right?

Right?
 
Why do you need 40 MPG anyway. I get like 12 the way I drive and I don't care. I can still afford to go around.

A statement like that is quite telling I think of just why Obama needs to make this decision. Change obviously is not going to come by itself if people do not realize that there is an issue with using fossil fuels.
 
A statement like that is quite telling I think of just why Obama needs to make this decision. Change obviously is not going to come by itself if people do not realize that there is an issue with using fossil fuels.
So then why are we still using fossil fuels? Why not invest all of the money that I'm sure went into this announcement and fund a hydrogen infrastructure?
 
A statement like that is quite telling I think of just why Obama needs to make this decision. Change obviously is not going to come by itself if people do not realize that there is an issue with using fossil fuels.

There is currently no alternative to them that ACTUALLY WORKS. He could be saying to research alternative fuels but instead he's just saying more MPG. A 40 MPG car still uses fossil fuels, and it will be getting 40 MPG best case scenario. My car is rated for 25 but it's not getting that. That's a not a change at all it's the same damn thing. They're just procrastinating on the issue. 10 more MPG isn't going to fix anything.
 
Here are some common family boring things. In 03 they all had 2s and 3s on pollution, this years models all have 6s. For reference those retarded hybrids have 8s. So right now a full gasoline car is only slightly worse than a Prius. Technology will advance and they will get even more efficient. We do not need laws for this it's barely an issue.

You're right about today's cars having less emission than older ones, but still a car with a 6-rating on pollution produces twice as much emissions when doing 20mpg than it would when doing 40. That's especially true in CO2 emissions, which are not filtered by any cleaning system and thus are directely proportional to the amount of fuel burned.

So then why are we still using fossil fuels? Why not invest all of the money that I'm sure went into this announcement and fund a hydrogen infrastructure?
That's the better question. Someone should ask Obama that (and the EU politicians he's basically copying). The even better question would be about funding research to generate hydrogen cheaply without using nuclear power...


EDIT:...but mostly, fuel efficiency will buy us time before oil runs out.
Given our current consumption, even the most optimistic estimates are not much more than 120 years. Which means our kids will see it.
As cars make up for only a small amount of the total pollution but a significant amount of oil consuption, that's what's really important here: Save oil until we got an alternative, being it hydrogen or solar power or wireless electricity or even tesla coils.
 
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lets see an explanation of how the government is stupid

Over here in the states, we focus on how much distance we can cover per unit of gasoline (e.g. miles/gallon). The way the U.S. government actually calculates it (say for the CAFE regulations) and the way Europe and other countries do it is by unit of gasoline consumed per unit of distance (e.g. gallons/mile). It's very interesting to realize the understand the difference of lower and higher gas mileage when you see it this format.

(to calculate gallons/mile, just take the inverse, or 1 divided by your mpg)

For example, let's take a 5mpg, 10mpg, 20mpg, 30mpg, and 40mpg car:

5mpg car = 0.2gallons/mile

10mpg car = 0.1gallons/mile

20mpg car = .05gallons/mile

30mpg car = 0.033gallons/mile

40mpg car = .025gallons/mile

You can see that it's actually a larger gain in efficiency to get cars with lower mpg (<20) off the road than it is to go from a 20mpg to 40mpg car. Basically, you'll save more money at the pump by getting rid of your 15mpg truck and going to a four cylinder SUV that can get 25mpg versus getting rid of your 20mpg minivan and going to a 30mpg sedan. And it really doesn't save you much by going from a 30mpg car to a 45mpg hybrid. I thought this was very interesting when I heard it on NPR the other day.

Here's an spreadsheet graph I made to illustrate it better:
fuel-economy-graph.gif


on another note, I'm not going to change my style of driving. The slower cars will require heavier acceleration which will negate the average fuel savings. For example, to drive in the same fashion (acceleration ect) my TSX does 20 mpg, the V8 Lexi does it in about 19mpg, and the prius i used to drive did 24 mpg. All of the cars were driven to get the same acceleration. The driving style was changed according to the car (I.E. the Lexi was pushed the least while the Prius was pushed the most). So fuel economy is relatively stupid for anything above 25-30 mpg, and the Prius and cars of the sort are mostly a waste.
 
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Obama wants less smog.

I want a Cummings (Duramax or Superduty is fine too).

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fokjHHJ0REY&feature=related[/YOUTUBE]
 
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Obama wants less smog.

I want a Cummings (Duramax or Superduty is fine too).

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fokjHHJ0REY&feature=related[/YOUTUBE]

I want a superduty that does that.

kinda like this
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QK0DxtiJd-k[/YOUTUBE]

And that is awesome.
 
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A statement like that is quite telling I think of just why Obama needs to make this decision. Change obviously is not going to come by itself if people do not realize that there is an issue with using fossil fuels.

Yeah, 'Forcing' people to change will work... :rolleyes:

Just like the Nazi's and Japanese forced POWs to build war materials for them, those were always perfect and without flaws...

Oh wait...



I'm all for change, I'm not for forcing people to change though, cause that's not what this country is about. You force someone to change you get piss poor results all the time, every time.

I need a couple of big thirsty V8 trucks now, and remove all emmisions equipment from them. And I need to plug the EGR on my car now, as thats the last emissions crap that's on the car. :mrgreen:

No one can meet this idiotic standard, no one will meet this idiotic standard. Politicians are a bunch of out of touch assholes who need to be beaten to death with a wingtip shoe.
 
Discouraging people from buying inefficient vehicles works a charm. There are various ways to do it, a fuel tax is next on my wish list of things I want from Obama, and it does just that.
No one can meet this idiotic standard, no one will meet this idiotic standard.
Excluding the fact that I think you are wrong, doesnt that mean lots of free dollars for your goverment? That they could go about spending on things like hydrogen research (I understand lots of people buy into what Clarkson is telling them about hydrogen, sure I hope it would work too but it plainly doesnt) or health care or elderly care or better schools or better roads or a official holiday celebrating Malcom McDonald or free pinballs or a movie ticket...

In any case, you're not the one getting fined for not meeting the targets.
 
Yeah, 'Forcing' people to change will work... :rolleyes:

Just like the Nazi's and Japanese forced POWs to build war materials for them, those were always perfect and without flaws...

Invoking Godwin? Has FG come so far?
 
Discouraging people from buying inefficient vehicles works a charm. There are various ways to do it, a fuel tax is next on my wish list of things I want from Obama, and it does just that.

You should have stopped at that. Problem with meeting the CAFE reqs is not just that there is alot of money that has to be spent on research or fines or w/e. It is more along the lines of passing the cost onto the customer.

Lets say I'm MB, I make luxury cars with a couple of sporty AMG's mixed in. In order to preserve acceleration/speed that customers are used to and meet CAFE I would have to lower weight and power. To lower weight there are a couple of things:
1) Remove safety equipment - not feasible or allowable in many ways, people won't buy a car that doesn't have side impact air bags these days, not one that costs as much as a Merc in any case

2) Remove luxury options - again it's a luxury brand and customers won't be buying my car if I take away their cooled and heated powerseats, 25 speakers with 6 subwoofers, 3 monitors, GPS navi, 10DVD changer, Blu-Ray player and a device that gives the driver oral on a long trip

3) Use lighter materials - lighter materials are expensive. For an example look at the Genesis coupe the turbo 4 version weighs as much as my car and I drive a sedan. However the car is cheaper than others in its class.

4) Make a hybrid - possible but again requires alot of R&D money and will raise costs as well as weight of the vehicle.

Problem is that these regs are not addressing the issue. Fuel economy/emissions are not the problem. We pretty much got everything out of an ICE that we could. The problem is dependency on fossil fuels and forcing companies to meet these regs or pay a fine will divert funds from their research into alternative ways of powering our vehicles.

It would be better if companies and consumers were given incentives to not only produce more fuel efficient cars but also produce cars that aren't necessarily using fossil fuels at all.

Remember you get more ants with honey than shit. Instead of saying "Your fleet MUST have 35mpg or better for cars" they should say "For every MPG over 33 you will get a tax break."
 
Discouraging people from buying inefficient vehicles works a charm. There are various ways to do it, a fuel tax is next on my wish list of things I want from Obama, and it does just that.

Stop ruining Amerikaland from overseas!


I'm not saying we don't need to change, but what will happen with this is that people will drive less instead of jumping to buy another car. When I graduate college, I will most likely end up buying a used car rather than some of the new crap that is produced (something like a used diesel truck or a M car).

And, on another aspect/viewpoint...lets meet my mom. She used to drive a Disco II, now she drives a Lexus. She likes a high driving position because she is short. What is she going to do: Buy a Prius and lift the suspension, or simply go straight to an SUV? Obviously she will go with the inefficient SUV, and there are a ton more people over here like that.

Now then. Lets meet a person that recovered from a broken back (a couple discs removed). He currently drives a hybrid because he used to believe in a cause, but he can't drive more than 1 hour straight in it. When he had a high riding suv, he could drive for 5 hours or more straight without his back cramping. What is his next car going to be, a prius? No. it will be a SUV, not because he necessarily wants one but because he needs one.

Another hypothetical situation. Lets say I like wakeboarding, so we just bought a boat, and we already have an RV. What would I do, attach the trailer to a Prius? No. I would buy an SUV to tow it. So would every other American. There are uses for trucks, and though some people don't have uses for them, other people have reasons for owning their "inefficient vehicles"
 
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Laudable objective - stupid implimentation.

Governments - what are you gonna do (Spectre says cede from the union btw - correct me if wrong spectre please!)?
 
Laudable objective - stupid implimentation.

Governments - what are you gonna do (Spectre says cede from the union btw - correct me if wrong spectre please!)?

Pretty much. My view is that the US goverment has finally crossed a line into excessive stupidity and regulation that cannot be fixed, that Texas is still workable (we're pretty much the only state that still has significant job growth and of the top ten cities for jobs we have something like eight because we don't have so many stupid regulations and restrictions on business and the economy), and that we need to undock from the sinking Federal ship before we get dragged down with it.

Please note that I do not advocate violent rebellion a la Civil War. I see no reason why Texas could not separate from the US in a peaceful secession process, such as how the Slovak Republic seceded from Czechoslovakia.


I should note that most Texans are all for eliminating smog and moving off petroleum products as the major foundation of energy production and transport. Entirely aside from the fact that petroleum is better used for other things (like plastics and production of goods and medicines) than just burning it, there's the fact that we'd prefer to sell our petroleum (and we have a lot of it) to other people for large sums of money as opposed to burning it ourselves. Texans support alternative energy; I for one would buy an electric runabout for work if I could be assured of a 100 mile range and charging stations at all my clients. Or a hydrogen car, if there were filling stations nearby.

The problem is, the Feds say that we can't put up the nuclear reactors to make this happen. Texas *wants* more reactors; if we had enough, we could phase out most of our gas and light diesel powered vehicles in favor of electrics and hydrogen. (Yes, I'd convert the Series III to hydrogen/electric if that was available - performance would actually increase) We'd be able to achieve the greens' dream of smog-free cities.

But the Feds won't let us.


Before someone says "what about wind" - yeah, we have some of the windiest spots in the country out in the Panhandle and West Texas, and we've been erecting wind farms at a stunning rate, but they're just not meeting the energy production goals set for them. Like the Brits, we find that they're maybe making 10-30% of claimed output and that just won't work.

Hydropower? Yeah, not so much. No big rivers capable of supporting much hydropower.

Solar? Yeah, we could have some out in West Texas. Again, Federal idiot regulations make that difficult.
 
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