New Study Throws Water on Obama Fuel-Economy Goals

Ward's Auto World ^ | June 2011 | Drew Winter

[Liberty1970]

A new report says the Obama Admin.’s proposed 62 mpg (3.8 L/100 km) fuel-economy target for 2025 could kill hundreds of thousands of jobs, put a $55,000 sticker on an ordinary family car and deliver only minor savings to consumers.

The study was produced by the Ann Arbor, MI-based Center for Automotive Research, which has been a darling of the White House in recent months.

[Liberty1970]

Given the obvious fact that there is already a free-market incentive for more fuel-efficient cars, it is a stunning sign of America's totalitarian mindset that it even tolerates unconstitutional edicts like CAFE. It's nice to see even CAR turning on Obama, at least!

[thethirddegree]

I hope I see the day when Obama is utterly brought down and shown to the world for the clueless fraud that he is.

[FrankR]

Grossly immature obama is like a little kid playing "pretend", with no concern that he's tracking doggie poop all over the place.

These utopian dreams of a Eloian world doesn't come without its Morelocks, someone has to be eaten in the process.

Seemingly, every policy or "change" that the "won" makes or proposes brings with it more unemployment and punitive price increases - two things which do not go together.

The sooner we can get this man-child out of the White Hut, the better. His maturity level is stuck at around 9 years old, prefering the playground (golf, bball) and a pat on the head from "mommy" (his adoring public) to actually doing anything - ANYTHING - good for America.

OK, some people don't do anthing good for America...we'll just call them busy, or lazy...but obama is doing everything BAD for America...and I call that TRAITOROUS.

[apillar]

His ultimate goal is to turn us into a European socialist “utopia”. Where the poor and lower middle class can't even afford a car and forced to use mass transit. If you are lucky enough to be well off enough to afford a automobile, your family of four is forced into a little puddle jumper like the new Volt. See in the socialist Utopia cars represent freedom and the more people that can be forced to rely on government transportation to get to work or the store give government one more means of control and creates a new entitlement not to mention hordes of new union government jobs.

[Turbo Pig]

These utopian dreams...

FrankR, I agree with 99% of what you said, the only thing I will differ on is the above statment. It's not utopian dreams we are dealing with, it's raw, unadulterated power mongering. The liberals just wrap it up in a pretty package for mass consumption.

They know full well what the outcome of their policies will be; to restrict the freedom of American citizens. In this case, if they make fuel and transport prices so high that average American's can't afford them, then they have the power to dictate the comings and goings of every person in the US.

The USSR, China, Nazi Germany, and many other socialist/fascist utopias, it's all the same.

[MulberryDraw]

Just grad-ee-ate more engineers so they can go out and invent stuff, like a 62 mpg car.

[Army Air Corps]

Auto Ping.

[Red Badger]

Rest In Peace, old friend, your work is finished.....

If you want ON or OFF the DIESEL ”KnOcK” LIST just FReepmail me.....

This is a fairly HIGH VOLUME ping list on some days.....

[Pilated]

Given my age I will never own a vehicle older than 2008 before I die. I guess that is what “they” are hoping for. People like me who want big cars and trucks to die off....

[CharlesWayneCT]

Really, there’s a free market incentive to get gas mileage up to maybe 40 mpg. But because of the way that number is calculated (meaning miles divided by gallons), going much above that just doesn’t make economic sense.

If we did efficients in gallons per mile (or gallons per 1000 miles, since people don’t like fractions), then it would be easy to see how ‘62 mpg’ is an absurd leap with little reward.

It’s because people drive miles, not gallons. doubling mileage from 10 mpg to 20 mpg saves a ton more money than doubling mileage from 30mpg to 60 mpg.

Assume you drive 10,000 miles. At 10 mpg, you buy 1000 gallons of gas. at 20mpg, you by 500 gallons, saving 500 gallons, or about $2000.

At 30 mpg, you buy about 333 gallons. Your total cost of gasoline is already more than the savings you get going from 10 to 20. At 60 mpg, you buy 167 gallons. Your savings, 166 gallons, is about $700. That $1300 less than the savings going from 10-20 mpg.

But increasing gas mileage from 30-60 mpg will cost about 3 times as much as increasing gas mileage from 10 to 20 mpg. And in fact, you are pushing up against the theoretical limits once you get to 60 mpg — there is a fixed cost of overcoming friction that means you’ll never have a car that can do 200 mpg.

I’m opposed to government setting standards. But if I supported standards, I would throw out the average mileage standard, and impose a minimum mileage standard instead, with a license you could buy to own a car that got less if you absolutely needed it.

It’s also why dropping a hybrid power train in an SUV actually makes a lot more sense than dropping one into a subcompact. Sure, I’m happy to get 45 mpg, but I’m not saving that much money over a 30-mpg equivalent car. But if I needed a 7-passenger SUV, and could double the mileage from 15 to 30, I’d save a ton of gas and money.

Of course, Obama isn’t trying to save gasoline or money, he’s trying to set an impossible standard so as to drive gas cars out of existance.

It’s the same trick they used for the incandescent light bulbs. In fact, they did NOT “ban” 100-watt bulbs. They simply set a “standard” that a 100-watt bulb would have to be 25%-50% more efficient (yes, that’s hilariously contradictory, as the definition of “100-watt” is that it uses 100 watts of power).

But actually, Westinghouse has managed to make a new incandescent light bulb that puts out the equivalent light of an older 100-watt bulb, while only using I think 70 watts of power — in order to meet the requirements of the new law.

Problem is, the bulb isn’t worth it. It will cost twice as much, and for most people they won’t save enough electricity to make it worthwhile. That’s why government had to force them to make the bulb.

[Rocketwolf68]

You’re right, and of course they can make a 62 mpg hybrid electric/petroleum vehicle- BUT, when they throw in SUV’s and trucks which necessarily have to be heavy because they carry heavy loads or pull trailers, then it becomes nearly impossible for the car companies to produce a fleet average anywhere near that number. Of course they could stop production of all trucks and SUV’s, and sometimes I think that’s been the plan all along. In the near future we will see Priuses carrying sheets of plywood on the top passing human powered rickshaws on their way out of home depot...