* the folly of SUV CAFE standards
Topics: Transportation
04 Apr 2006
From: Ervan Darnell
Congress just raised the CAFE (mileage) targets for light trucks (i.e.
pickups & SUVs) [1]. The previous CAFE standard for autos has made no
difference since 1981 [2]. That's two decades of failure. Failure by
the objective of CAFE itself, saving gas. Whether it made any
difference before that is harder to say. Mileage improved pre 1981, but
gas prices and shortages also created a incentive for improvement
(really for the first time, so the easy mileage fixes were all made then).
Part of the reason that mileage has not improved since is that consumers
have moved away from trucks toward SUVs[3]. Greens decry that as an
unfortunate coincidence. They should instead accept responsibility for
causing the situation. Some of that mileage came out of better
technology but some of it came simply out of making cars less powerful
and lighter (therefore less safe and more expensive to repair). Those
were the only choices left to make the targets. That all contributes to
making cars less desirable. For people sitting on the fence between a
truck and a car, that cars are somehow less desirable, even if they
don't put numbers to that, makes them prefer the truck. Also, higher
CAFE standards contributes to the base cost of the car more (more exotic
materials, more R&D to amortize), shifting the balance to trucks.
In fairness, one might argue that CAFE has at least held the line while
consumer preferences have been for larger vehicles, but one could also
argue that a natural preference for more fuel efficiency, as technology
makes it possible, is offset by the CAFE-induced jump all of the way
from a car to a truck. The hidden issue here is that CAFE was sold as a
mechanism for inducing manufacturers to truly improve fuel efficiency.
What it has done is make cars smaller and lighter just to meet the
targets (sometimes lighter counts as innovation with new materials and
sometimes it counts simply as more flimsy to meet the targets).
One price control always leads to the next, to try to fx the previous
mistake with another. In this case, the CAFE standards are now
tightened on trucks to make up for their failure as applied to cars.
The current strategy is to set the target mileage by vehicle size. That
does not change anything. If lighter trucks have to be made lighter
still to make the targets, consumers will just move to heavier trucks to
get the hauling capacity they want. Maybe this is why Detroit has not
lobbied against the higher CAFE targets (at least not very hard).
The thought that prompted me to write this is the fear that it might
work this time. Work in the following limited sense: the screws will be
tigthened enough that there is no adequate vehicle. Forcing consumers
into smaller cars doesn't make a commute impossible, merely
uncomfortable. Trucks are different. Forcing trucks to be small enough
that you cannot get all of the neighborhood kids, or all of the ski
gear, or whatever, into one truck makes for a real concession. It may
mean more vehicles on the road, more trips with the same vehicle, or it
may mean quietly losing some part of pleasure in life because the trip
logistics become too difficult as no adequate vehicle is available.
That cost will never be fairly assessed against CAFE by the bureaucrats
and few consumers will think to blame CAFE for their new loss of pleasure.
[1] Reuters 3/28/06, http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=1778863&page=1
[2] figure ES3, http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/rtecs/nhts_survey/2001/,
[3] http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/reg20n4-per.html, this article
makes many of the same points I made here. I wrote the above before
finding this article, so I'll send the above as my thoughts anyway.
_______________________________________________
Ragnar mailing list
Ragnar@ragnar.kelvinist.com
http://ragnar.kelvinist.com/mailman/listinfo/ragnar
Home