Officials from the Environmental Protection Agency and the California Air Resources Board will meet this month to discuss 2022-2025 fuel efficiency standards.
The agreement the EPA struck with automakers in 2012 on fuel efficiency rules included a midterm review by April, 2018. The EPA finished the review more than a year early, days before President Obama left office. The agency concluded that automakers were on track to meet the stringent fleetwide standard of 51.4 mpg by 2025. EPA had earlier revised that down from 54.5 mpg based on the increasing number of SUVs and light trucks.
NADA and automakers are pushing for a further downward revision based on the changing consumer preference for larger vehicles. Automakers met with President Trump soon after he took office, and he reopened the midterm review. That has given auto industry officials hope that the standards will be lowered. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is also part of the midterm review and plans to issue any proposed changes by March 30.
California has long had a waiver to federal rules and has been allowed to create its own rules to deal with its own severe air pollution. Dealers and automakers very much want a single national standard, and that is why the talks between EPA and CARB are important. Twelve states (including Maryland and DC) follow California fuel efficiency rules. Last June, those states threatened to go to court to protest any rollback in the rules.