The Biden administration announced new automobile emissions standards Wednesday that officials called the most ambitious plan ever to cut planet-warming emissions from passenger vehicles.
The new rules relax initial tailpipe limits proposed last year but eventually get close to the same strict standards set out by the Environmental Protection Agency.
The rules come as sales of electric vehicles, which are needed to meet the standards, have begun to slow. The auto industry cited lower sales growth in objecting to the EPA’s preferred standards unveiled last April as part of its ambitious plan to cut planet-warming emissions from passenger vehicles.
The EPA said that under its final rule, the industry could meet the limits if 56% of new vehicle sales are electric by 2032, along with at least 13% plug-in hybrids or other partially electric cars, as well as more efficient gasoline-powered cars that get more miles to the gallon.
Those make up a pretty negligible amount of emissions. Global aviation overall only accounts for 2.5% of CO2 emissions. While it may be horribly wasteful, focusing on it is not going to really do shit overall.
True, but from what I’ve been seeing about the currently approaching climate crisis, we need to do everything that we can to stop or at least slow it to find more solutions.
Absolutely! I am very annoyed that the Biden admin caved and are slowing the move to EVs. We need to be keeping the same time line and forcing light trucks to up their efficiency too. We also need to move away from fossil fuels in energy production. Then we need to add in tariffs for products coming from countries not meeting their emissions targets.
There is a fuckton we need to do to minimize how far above and how long we will be over a 1.5°C rise.
Perhaps, but it’s a low impact, high reward thing. The amount of CO2 it conserves per person affected by the change is low and the people who are affected can easily afford alternative transportation. People who drive gas vehicles often have no alternative transportation available because they can’t afford new cars, don’t have access to charging, and/or don’t have access to public transportation and so need that transportation in order to survive. People with private planes can fly on public planes, use slower transportation methods, or invest in lower emissions planes and not have any impact to their ability to survive.