Levin Loophole Amendment: "Commit" to alternative fuels and get a CAFE exemption

[HoosierRon]

Levin is quoting Lutz, nearly verbatim

http://www.autobloggreen.com/2007/05...-of-cafe-regs/

US Senator Carl Levin, D- the State of Cars, will be offering an amendment to the proposed new fuel economy regulations next month that would provide a way out for carmakers. Under the new proposal, carmakers that commit to power using alternative fuels or new powertrains on all their cars by 2020 would be exempted from the new rules.

I read this to mean every car mut be either E85, biodiesel, hybrid or electric.

The source is Automotive News. If you have a subscription, you can read more.

[1931Chevy]

So this means that by 2020 we might have a diesel fusion, plug in Malibu, hydrogen Escalade and a hydraulic F150

[Xenon]

How bout drop CAFE altogheter? I don't feel like paying $30K for a Cobalt 10- 20 years down the road.

[asim]

This loophole / exemption thing seems pretty smart to me. This way it doesn't force the automakers to reach a ridiculous standard. GM can just make every one of their cars compatible with E85 (a lot of them are already) -- and I am sure that it doesn't take too much to convert to it. It is also easy to rig up each vehicle with a BAS hybrid system. This is the easy way out, but I am sure that all the automakers are now committed to have BIG increases in fuel economy.

[editor]

Originally Posted by asim

This loophole / exemption thing seems pretty smart to me. This way it doesn't force the automakers to reach a ridiculous standard. GM can just make every one of their cars compatible with E85 (a lot of them are already) -- and I am sure that it doesn't take too much to convert to it. It is also easy to rig up each vehicle with a BAS hybrid system. This is the easy way out, but I am sure that all the automakers are now committed to have BIG increases in fuel economy.

It's hard to say what it means at this point, because the "advanced technology" that the provision in the bill refers to is not defined in the bill.

We ran a post on it yesterday if you want a little more detail:

http://www.autosavant.net/2007/05/pr...nies-from.html

It's kind of strange in that basically the proposal would rely on the honor system with the automakers; promise you'll do this and we'll give you a free pass until 2020. I'm not sure what the chances of getting that through Congress are at this point.

[ronald mcretard]

I don't get the logic behind this. It seems like if you are going to be putting "advanced technology" in the cars, like hybrid systems or fuel cells or whatever, then you're going to meet the new emissions standards anyway. Why would you need to be exempt?

Unless they think that a company would keep the status quo for the next 13 years and then suddenly switch to 100% alternative systems, and that ain't gonna happen.

By the way, would this bill apply to EVERY car the company makes, or just some kind of fleet-wide average thing? (I'm thinking about heavy duty pickups, Corvettes, etc.)

[DuSpinnst]

You all know CAFE is not mandatory right?

If you don't meet it you just pay fines. I am pretty sure BMW still pays fines every year for not meeting the minimum.

Unless they changed something recently.

[LAMRONH]

Originally Posted by editor

It's hard to say what it means at this point, because the "advanced technology" that the provision in the bill refers to is not defined in the bill.

We ran a post on it yesterday if you want a little more detail:

http://www.autosavant.net/2007/05/pr...nies-from.html

It's kind of strange in that basically the proposal would rely on the honor system with the automakers; promise you'll do this and we'll give you a free pass until 2020. I'm not sure what the chances of getting that through Congress are at this point.

Sounds like Levin is trying to derail the CAFE bill. Good idea.
Congress is in the habit of passing vague laws that must be hashed out by someone else later.
With intentional vagueness and high-tech sounding "promises," it gets Congress off the hook and almost all these guys except the Byrds and Kennedys will be retired on fat pensions by 2020.

Not so strange. Doesn't Congress operate on the honor system?

[Caleb02]

Originally Posted by Xenon

How bout drop CAFE altogheter? I don't feel like paying $30K for a Cobalt 10- 20 years down the road.

hate to be the one to break the news to you, but in 20 years due to inflation the Colbat even without CAFE and other government addons will be about $30,000 after all a Camaro used to be a few thousand dollars when it first came out.

[Tico]

Originally Posted by Xenon

How bout drop CAFE altogheter? I don't feel like paying $30K for a Cobalt 10- 20 years down the road.

That will happen anyway. You can easily pay over 20K now. In 10 years for sure it will be $30K. What did Cavaliers cost in 1997? How about entry level Chevy in $1987?

[Chaz_23]

Better buy the car of your dreams soon and take good care of it. In a few years we'll all forced to drive those hideous Euro-tins.

[New_Mexico_Sunset_on_Rt66]

Am I the only one who finds it odd that this happens to coincide with the recent announcement from Toyota, that all their cars will be hybrids by 2020?

I mean, lets not make it so obvious that you are selling us out.

[Wolfman01]

Uhh, Toyota has put off their plan by 8 years with that press release. They were originally slated for 2012.