EPA to ease emission limits, reports say, setting up clash with California

Chrome exhaust pipeThe omens have been accumulating for months, as bits of information dribble out of the regulatory rumor mill in Washington, D.C. Now we have the most concrete reports yet that the U.S. EPA plans to modify exhaust emission limits for vehicles in model years 2022 through 2025. The EPA delivered its draft Final Determination document to the Office of...

CA attorney general: we will fight looser fuel-economy, emission rules

National Plug-In Day 2012: San Francisco, with 60 Nissan Leafs in front of the Golden Gate BridgeLast Tuesday, EPA administrator Scott Pruitt said the agency does not intend to let California set the agenda for national emission limits on vehicles. He suggested to Bloomberg the EPA plans to cut emission rules aggressively to respond to carmakers' pleas for easing of the corporate average fuel economy rules for 2022 through 2025 that they had...

Why the future of electric cars depends on China’s war on pollution

Woman with smog mask (pic by Nicolò Lazzati on Flickr)Roughly half of everyone alive in the U.S. today has never experienced really bad smog. Those over, say, age 45—big-city residents and Angelenos especially—may recall hazy days in which the sun was barely visible, and air that actually tasted metallic. It's a memorable experience, and it's why the future of electric cars increasingly...

India plan for converting to electric cars by 2030 may get trimmed, a lot

Smog in Dehli, India (by Flickr user Mfield)Two years ago, the government of India proposed a remarkable and ambitious goal: make every new vehicle coming onto its roads electric by 2030. The plan was largely a response to some of the world's highest levels of hazardous air pollution in its cities, higher in many cases than the legendary foul air in Chinese cities. The world's second-most...

NHTSA could cite safety of heavier cars in slashing CAFE rules: reports

Gas pumpIt's been clear that under the Trump administration, the NHTSA and EPA plan to roll back linked fuel-economy rules and emission limits on new vehicles. Now a possible justification that will be used has emerged—and it's not the one many advocates had expected. According to a Bloomberg report on Monday, the fuel-economy proposal due March 30...