Several automakers join Trump admin in suit against California greenhouse gas regulation

Why are you disappointed?

The manufacturers are saying it’s more logical to have one national standard.

https://www.nhtsa.gov/sites/nhtsa.dot.gov/files/documents/rev_fact_sheet_cafe_nprm_by_the_numbers_003-tag.pdf

 

but that one national standard could be california's, as it is now.

interesting to see automakers divided on this

 

I'm really disappointed in Toyota, turning its back on a state that has supported them probably more than any other state in the US.

California's strict air quality laws come from a time when smog was so bad in LA it made China's air look clean. Kids in LA didn't even realize there were mountains nearby. LA is a natural bowl that collects whatever is in the air. Spanish explorers noticed it full of smoke from the various fires of the native communities that lived in the area.

So there was a bipartisan effort to declare war on the smog. And they succeeded! The air is much, much cleaner now (though far from perfect).

Trump is just being Trump--going against anything green, and attempting to turn back (probably illegally) the law that gives California the right to have tougher rules for polluting autos. BMW, Ford, Honda, and VW are to be commended for doing a voluntary agreement with the state to follow its stricter rules.

But Toyota--slamming a knife into the gut of the state that has supported you all these decades. How could you? It makes me ashamed to own one of your cars.

 

So you're in favor of a fleet *average* of 54.5mpg (real world 47mpg) by 2025?

 

i am, unless convinced otherwise

 

Those manufacturers can say what they want now, but achieving the 2025 goals would mean they would be selling vehicles that very few customers actually want.

 

but if that's all that is available...

 

That is using CAFE standards for measuring fuel economy, which are very out-of-date and are highly inflated compared to EPA standards.

The talked-about 2025 CAFE standard — usually described as 54.5 mpg — amounts to a figure of 36 mpg combined [highway and city driving] on a window sticker," writes Dan Edmunds, director of vehicle testing at Edmunds.com

And that's an average, including hybrids and electric cars.

 

Consumers will keep their old vehicles, sending the entire auto industry into a massive decline.

 

you can't keep them forever. some will, and some will change. i think your exaggerating the fallout though

 

CAFE is 54 mpg for the entire fleet of cars that a manufacturer produces. Originally there was only one number for mileage on the window sticker and cars would rarely meet it. They adjusted the numbers down and switched to the three number system of city, highway and combined mileage but those numbers were not much better. CAFE still uses the inflated mileage number 54 mpg but In real world mileage that is 36 combined mpg on the window sticker.

Our Prius already far exceeds that number. Not everyone wants to drive a Prius but it has most of the innovations that could get many ICE vehicles to a combined average of 36 mpg. We have continuously variable transmissions, we have stop/start at traffic lights and direct fuel injection is being added to many models that are currently being offered which will boost the mileage of those models.

Again CAFE is a fleet average. The mix of vehicles must maintain the fleet at 36 mpg this year or those manufacturers pay a penalty. The 2019 Prius gets 52 mpg, a Prius Prime gets 133 mpg, a RAV4 hybrid gets 40, a Highlander 4WD gets 22 and Tundra 4WD V8 gets 16 combined. Those 5 vehicles that I just mentioned get a fleet combined average of 52 mpg which easily exceeds the fleet 36 mpg target.

The problem is that those standards were created when the mix was 2/3 cars and 1/3 trucks but the top three sellers in North America today are the Ford, Chevy and Dodge pickup truck. Trucks and large SUV's really drag down that corporate fuel economy. Ford F150 4WD 6 cylinder 18 mpg, Ford Expedition 4WD 6 cylinder 19 mpg, Chevy Silverado 4WD 6 cylinder 17 mpg, Chevy Traverse AWD 6 cylinder 20 mpg, Durango AWD 6 cylinder 21 mpg, Ram 1500 4WD 6 cylinder 21 mpg.

Hence the problem. Automakers make more money on trucks and large SUV's so they want these standards reduced so they don't have to pay the penalties.

 

. I guess VW have nothing to worry about - they have some super-duper tech that can produce any mpg, at least on the test dyno

... This reminds me of the typical shopping experience in the Soviet Union of yore ...

 

Isn't it that Toyota supported a state by creating what that state wanted? The rest of the USA wasn't asking for it. Toyota delivered. People bought Toyota because Toyota delivered with Toyota reliability.

Have to give credit where it is due. GM, Ford, Chrysler, Kia, Volvo, BMW, VW didn't step up to the plate.

I certainly wouldn't be ashamed for really making a difference in the environment - Toyota shouldn't, nor should you.

 

"Have to give credit where it is due. GM, Ford, Chrysler, Kia, Volvo, BMW, VW didn't step up to the plate."

do not know, seems to me toyota did it only because they had to. are you making a difference for the environment if you drive a prius so you can sort of make up for the 4x4 you race on desert dunes on the weekend? maybe a shade more than the guy who also uses that 4x4 on his daily drive.

why i've lost faith that toyota actually is or wants to be "good" beyond where they absolutely must:

1. (good only because they have to) - mirai just screams compliance car in the lease only, limited support structure. shades of GM's EV-1. maybe i've been deluding myself all these years, and the prius is also a different shade of compliance car, see 2...
2. (not all that good) - despite having the mirai, prius, etc, toyota's fleet average is totally middle of the pack (barely offsetting all the guzzler vehicles they must be marketing and selling to have such a low CAFE avg ~2017, the last available year posted on nhtsa (passing in some vehicle categories offsetting fails in others).
3. (wanting to not have to be good) - joining in the suit to push back the standard, rather than just sitting out the court fight .

BMWs i3 for example may be totally compliance car to try and offset the rest of their fleet, but rather than trying to push back the standard at least they're signing on with the CARB standards and trying to roll with and meet it.

when my current prius dies, it may be the last toyota for me for a while. with CA's public safety power shutoffs, having only a pure BEV may not be a great choice in the short term, so hybrid, PHEV, may have to be a backup plan. i think the idea of the i3 ReX's little gas tank is so adorable (obviously a regulatory driven choice, but totally amusing). if they come out with a slightly larger version with a backseat AND a trunk (not either/or) "i5 ReX" or whatever I may be all on that. Or a if they make PHEV insight from Honda. even the straight hybrid insight has mpg only 6% worse than prius so that might be a choice, but if the old prius can hang on another few years there should be even more choices, especially if CARB prevails.

the automakers overblow it as having to make a whole different set of vehicles for CA vs the rest of the nation. no, not exactly. with the mix of cars they need to meet the national standards there will be some better and some worse. just means they will have to sell more of the better and less of the worse ones in CA, or pay the fines. so that's why i'm especially disappointed in toyota joining the "bad guys" in the suit. they easily could have just sat it out.

 

i think the bigger fallout will be the evolution away from ownership. when full self driving (FSD) gets implemented well, a majority of people may find it pointless to own your own FSD car. i can see a couple possible models, not mutually exclusive.

1) municipal FSD microbus arrays replacing regular bus/light rail routes. rather than a big 40-60 passenger bus every 15-30 minutes, 4-6 10 passenger ones (or 10 6 passenger ones?) in that same span (one every 3-5 min). N-S and E-W routes blanketing a city, hop on/off, lots of points, swarm AI to go/adjust to where they're needed. i'm thinking that a 4 bench compartment microbus would be ideal (4 benches each with separate door). each compartment is a 2 seater divided bench, and when you call it up on the app you can choose to have the bench all to yourself or shared for a lower price. if you hogged up the whole bench with your stuff, the rider who called for a shared bench finding it unavailable would tag couldn't get on, and you get charged the higher rate, so you couldn't game it requesting shared bench but denying the space.
2) subscription or pay as you go uber/lyft/waymo owned FSD car fleets for point a to b trips. or maybe the mfrs themselves operate the fleets (tesla hinting at it, but their "autopilot" cruise control already has enough issues that i doubt they'll be first or best at FSD).
3) personally owned FSD cars, used to supplement or instead of company owned fleets, on call for a to b trips. e.g. you drive to your work, click it into taxi mode, and away it goes to do its side job (uber etc take their cut), and when you're done with work it's come back to your and off you go home (and then if you want send it off again for more taxi jobs, or maybe if it's a BEV it needs its charge time).

Even in mode 3 it's 1/2 to 1/4 or even less of the current number of vehicles sold. automakers will have to adapt or die. won't be the first industry killed or shrunk to near nothing by technology (remember eastman kodak?).

 

Another thread for the Political sub-forum swamp?

 

tl;dr

but considering that nothing has really changed in the last 20 years, i probably won't see anything significant iml

 

yup.

 

You seem to have quite a bit more faith than I that car manufacturers actually know what customers want. Here are 50 counterpoints to that argument.

For those interested, the first car on that list is this bad boy: