[iceQuity]

Big Buyer
Friday, January 27, 2012 12:57:25 AM
Re: None
Post # of 21402
Time for Savicorp to step in.
California regulators were considering new rules Thursday that would require dramatic cuts in emissions from most cars and trucks by 2025.

The new "advanced clean cars" regulations, proposed by the state Air Resources Board, would require cars and light trucks sold in 2025 to emit 75% fewer emissions of smog-forming pollutants, and about a third less carbon dioxide. The program envisions that one in seven new cars sold in California in 2025 will run on electricity or hydrogen and produce no emissions, or run on electricity and gasoline to produce much lower emissions than conventional gasoline-fueled cars.

The rules would apply to cars and light trucks for model years 2017 and later.

State officials said the clean car rules are in line with a federal proposal to boost fuel efficiency standards for most cars and trucks to 54.4 miles per gallon by 2025. The regulations are the latest in a stream of strict emissions limits, some of which have been suspended pending litigation.

Auto makers including Ford Motor Co. (F), General Motors Co. (GM), Chrysler Group, Daimler AG's (DAI.XE, DDAIY) Mercedes Benz and others said they supported the effort, although they opposed some of the details and asked the board to make changes.

Auto makers also expressed concern about meeting expectations for hydrogen-fueled vehicles amid uncertainty about whether adequate supplies of hydrogen would be available to consumers.

Although GM has developed cars that run on electricity and hydrogen, the company is concerned that such vehicles won't take off if "consumers can't refuel," Robert Babik, a GM representative told the board at a meeting Thursday.

Groups representing oil refiners and service stations, however, criticized a provision of the rules that they said would require service stations to provide hydrogen fuel to support vehicles that have yet to penetrate the market and that they said could cost millions of dollars each.

The provision would unfairly force "non-interested parties" to invest in equipment that may not be profitable, Cathy Reheis-Boyd, president of the Western States Petroleum Association, said at the meeting.

Air Resources Board Chair Mary Nichols said the clean car rules wouldn't impose hydrogen fueling requirements on service stations, but that state regulators hoped station owners would voluntarily provide the fuel.

Auto dealers complained that the rules would boost the cost of making low-emission cars and drive up prices for consumers.

The Air Resources Board has estimated that the rules will add an average of $1,900 to vehicle prices, which the agency said would be offset by savings on fuel purchases that would average about $6,000 over the life of the car.

Consumer and environmental groups voiced support for the proposed rules.

Consumers Union, an arm of the Consumer Reports publication, the Consumer Federation of America and Consumers for Auto Reliability and Safety said the rules will protect consumers "by encouraging the development of cleaner, more efficient cars that save families money," according to a statement.

The rules are the latest version of regulations originally adopted in 1990 to improve air quality in California, which has some of the nation's dirtiest air. This time, the clean car rules also aim to cut greenhouse-gas emissions from cars and trucks, in line with the state's 2006 plan to combat climate change.

A federal judge in December suspended a separate set of California rules that aim to cut the carbon content of vehicle fuels, pending resolution of a lawsuit that ethanol and petroleum fuel makers filed against the ARB. The ARB has said that it plans to appeal the ruling, which found that the state's low carbon fuel standard violated federal law.

State and local officials said the clean car rules are essential to clean the state's air, particularly in Los Angeles and other southern California cities that routinely rank as the nation's most polluted.

"We suffer from the worst air quality in the nation," a representative of the South Coast Air Quality Management District told the board Thursday. "We need the acceleration of these technologies and at an accelerated pace."

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