Trump Admin Weakens Clean Car Standards Despite Its Analyses Showing Rule Favors Big Oil Over Health, Climate

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The Trump administration today announced the final rule that rolls back Obama-era clean vehicle standards, a move that,ย according to the governmentโ€™s own analyses, is expected to benefit the oil industry and harm consumers, public health, and theย climate.

Experts also warn it will result in litigation and global market inconsistency to the detriment ofย automakers.

The Safer Affordable Fuel Efficient (SAFE) Vehicles rule rolls back fuel economy and greenhouse gas emission standards for new cars and light duty trucks in model years 2021 through 2026. Under the standards adopted by the Obama administration in 2012, light-duty vehicles would be required to meet the average fleetwide fuel economy equivalent of 54.5 miles per gallon in model year 2025.ย Those standards were projected to save roughly 4 billion barrels of oil and cut carbon dioxide emissions by 2 billon metric tons while saving consumers more than $1.7 trillion in fuelย costs.

The Trump administrationย standards require average fuel economy of only about 40 miles per gallon in 2025, with annual increases of 1.5 percent starting in 2021, as opposed to the 5 percent annual increase under the Obama standards. The laxer standards under the SAFE rule are expected to result in over a billion metric tons more climate pollution throughย 2040.

The move was condemned byย former and some current Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)ย employees.

โ€œThe new rule is a reprehensible debacle โ€” our Climate Denier-in-Chief and his EPA and NHTSA political lackeys are massively rolling back our countryโ€™s most successful climate program, using the cover of the coronavirus pandemic to hide that they have no defensible rationale and opposition by many automakers,โ€ย said Jeff Alson, former EPA senior engineer and policy advisor in the Office of Transportation and Air Quality.ย โ€œThis senseless rollback will lead to a hotter and more dangerous planet for our children and grandchildren, and will take money from the pockets of American families to fatten oil company profits.โ€ Alson has spent the last 10ย years of his career working on the clean carย standards.

The EPAย and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) have for the past decade jointly set the greenhouse gas emissions and fuel economy standards. The joint national program, first announced by Obama in 2009, came on the heels of the auto industry bailout and was welcomed byย automakers.

The national program also aligned with stricter clean vehicle standards sought by California, which has authority under the Clean Air Act to adopt its own vehicle emissionsย standards.

Now automakers, though they had initially lobbied the Trump administration for weaker standards, could face more uncertainty especially given Californiaโ€™s legal challenge to the federal governmentโ€™s revocation of its Clean Air Act authority. Several automakers including Ford, Honda, BMW of North America, and Volkswagen Group of America agreed last year to adhere to Californiaโ€™s more stringent vehicle standards, while a coalition of other automakers backed the Trump administration in the lawsuit, thus dividing the autoย industry.

The new SAFE rule is expected to draw legal challenges from progressive states and environmental groups, creating further uncertainty for automakers. Experts also warn the rollbacks will disadvantage U.S. automakers competing in the global market as other countries move towardย raising fuel economy and slashing climateย emissions.

โ€œGlobally the goal posts for fuel economy standards and greenhouse gas emissions have moved significantly in the last two years with major markets moving forward as the U.S. is moving backwards,โ€ย said Margo Oge, former Director of the EPA Office of Transportation and Air Quality.ย โ€œThe EU, for example, set a new CO2 car standard at 76 [miles per gallon]ย for 2030 with an aggressive plan to transform the entire auto industry to electric vehicles. And, adding insult to injury, even EPAโ€™s own analysis found that the new rule will result in a loss of thousands of auto industryย jobs.โ€

โ€œThe auto sector is already reeling from economic turmoil related to the COVID-19 pandemic, and this rule will lead to prolonged litigation, regulatory uncertainty and economic disarray,โ€ Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) told E&E News.

As E&E News reported, a leaked draft of the final rule obtained by Carperโ€™s office reveals flaws in the cost-benefit analysis that the Trump administration failed to correct from an earlier version that leaked in January. Additional costs of the rule include more premature deaths from tailpipe air pollution and more consumer spending on gasoline with vehicles that are lessย fuel-efficient.

Disastrous for Health and theย Climate

Environmental advocates and former EPA officials slammed the Trump administrationโ€™s clean car standards rollbacks, noting the adverse impacts they are expected to have on public health at a time when the U.S. is reeling from the coronavirus public healthย crisis.

โ€œActions that increase air pollution and costs are dangerous at any time, but taking such action now, when the countryโ€™s attention is focused on a pandemic, is unconscionable,โ€ Environmental Defense Fundโ€™s (EDF) Peter Zalzal said inย aย statement.

โ€œThe Trump administrationโ€™s rollback condemns Americans to choke on smog and suffer more climate pollution from refineries and tailpipes,โ€ said Maya Golden-Krasner, a Los Angeles-based attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. โ€œItโ€™s shameful that Trump officials pushed this through during a viral pandemic that preys on people with asthma and other health problems linked to dirtyย air.โ€

Lowerย fuel economy results in greater tailpipe emissions, increasing hazardous air pollutants and planet-warming carbon emissions. One group, the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy (ACEEE) estimates that the administrationโ€™s action will add at least 131 million metric tons of carbon dioxide to the air annually byย 2035.

โ€œThe rollback does not follow what we know from health science; it will instead make air quality worse and threaten the health of our children, the elderly, outdoor workers, and people who suffer from respiratory illnesses and heart disease,โ€ said Trish Koman, PhD, who served as a Senior Environmental Scientist in the EPA Office of Transportation and Air Quality and currently is a researcher at the University of Michigan School of Publicย Health.

โ€œLetโ€™s be clear because lives are at stake. Over 100,000 people are dying prematurely from air pollution each year in our country and the numbers have been increasing since 2017,โ€ added Mustafa Santiago Ali, vice president for environmental justice at the National Wildlife Federation and former EPA Senior Advisor for Environmental Justice and Community Revitalization. โ€œPoor air quality not only worsens asthma and other respiratory conditions, but also is linked to cardiac harm, cancer, and premature death. Communities of color and lower income communities are literally dying for a breath of clean air and this rule will pump more deadly pollution into their neighborhoods, resulting in an increase in chronic disease and making our most vulnerable more susceptible to viruses like COVID-19.โ€

Under the new SAFE rule, analyses show the lower fuel economy standards would result in an additional 1.5 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions by 2040. That is roughly equivalent to the emissions from 68 coal plants operating for five years, according to EDF. ACEEE estimates the rollbacksโ€™ impact will be equivalent to adding nearly 29 million cars to theย roads.

โ€œThis is a major setback in addressing climate change, and thatโ€™s something we canโ€™t afford,โ€ said ACEEE senior fellow Thereseย Langer.

Boost for Bigย Oil

Despite the Trump administrationโ€™s claims that the rollbacks benefit American families and consumers, the ultimate beneficiary is the oil industry that profits from higher fuel consumption from less efficientย vehicles.

โ€œBy hitting the brakes on corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) and greenhouse gas emissions standards, the administration will cause the owner of an average model year 2025 vehicle to fill up the gas tank 62 more times over the life of the vehicle,โ€ ACEEE said in a press release.

According to EDFโ€™s analysis, by 2040 the rollbacks will result in 142 billion more gallons of fuel used, and $244 billion more in consumer spending at the gasย pump.

That directly boosts the revenues of the oilย companies.

A New York Times investigation in December 2018 revealed the behind-the-scenes influence of oil company Marathon Petroleum and major petroleum industry trade association American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) in pushing for weaker clean car standards. AFPM, whose members include industry titans like ExxonMobil and Chevron, has been a leading proponent of lowering theย standards.

AFPM did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but the group praised the Trump administrationโ€™s initial proposal to revise the standards inย 2018.

The American Energy Allianceย (AEA), a fossil fuel industry front group that has been a major recipient of AFPM cash, also advocated for the rollbacks and celebrated the announcement Tuesday of the final rule. โ€œThis is a win all around,โ€ AEA president Thomas Pyle, a former lobbyist for Koch Industries, said in a statement. He added that AEA would prefer the CAFร‰ program be eliminatedย entirely.

Competitive Enterprise Institute, which hasย downplayed the climate crisis and hasย received $2.1 million in funding from ExxonMobil since 1997, also applauded the new SAFE rule while echoing its preference forย even furtherย deregulation.

During a House Oversight Committee hearing last fall on the oil industryโ€™s influence on the clean car standards rollback, a Republican committee member inadvertently referenced the oil industry in defending an unsuccessful attempt by him and his GOP colleagues to adjourn the hearing. That initial inclination to bring up the oil industry, as DeSmog previously reported, โ€œset the stage for witnesses to reveal who reallyย benefits.โ€

In response to the announcement finalizing the SAFE rule, former EPA administrator under Obama and current president of the Natural Resources Defense Council Gina McCarthy said crippling the clean car standards โ€œmakes no senseโ€ and only benefits the oilย companies.

โ€œIt will harm the air we breathe, stall progress in fighting the climate crisis, and increase the cost of driving,โ€ she said. โ€œThe only winner from this action is the oil industry, which wants us stuck driving dirty gas guzzlers as long asย possible.โ€

Main image: President Trump in front of a gasoline refinery in Mandan, North Dakota. Credit:ย Official White House Photo by D. Myles Cullen,ย publicย domain

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Dana is an environmental journalist focusing on climate change and climate accountability reporting. She writes regularly for DeSmog covering topics such as fossil fuel industry opposition to climate action, climate change lawsuits, greenwashing and false climate solutions, and clean transportation.

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