In the past, new fuel economy standards have resulted in the production of smaller vehicles that fail to adequately protect occupants from suffering serious or fatal personal injuries in collisions. The federal government’s proposed CAFE standards have elicited concerns among safety advocates and lawyers in California and elsewhere for the safety of American drivers.
The rising cost of oil and the threat to the environment from excessive carbon emissions has led to new federal fuel economy standards for Americans. On May 21, 2010, President Barack Obama requested that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) work together to develop a program to improve the fuel efficiency of the nation’s vehicles. Given that past federal mandates to improve fuel economy have been accompanied by a higher incidence of serious and fatal personal injury in auto accidents, some safety advocates and lawyers in California and elsewhere have questioned whether the new standards will jeopardize the safety of drivers.
In response to President Obama’s 2010 directive to improve the fuel efficiency of the nation’s fleet, the EPA and the NHTSA developed a proposal for new fuel economy and greenhouse gas standards for passenger cars and light trucks for model years 2017-2025. The proposal set new Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards for auto manufacturers. CAFE is the sales weighted average fuel economy of an automaker’s fleet of passenger cars or light trucks with a gross vehicle weight rating (GVWR) of 8,500 pounds of less. The standard applies to all vehicles manufactured for sale in the United States and is measured in miles per gallon (mpg). Under the new proposal, a fleet-wide standard of 40.1 mpg would be effective by model year 2021 and of 49.6 mpg by model year 2025.
In addition, the EPA proposed standards for greenhouse gas emissions (GHG), requiring no more than 163 grams per mile of carbon dioxide (CO2) by model year 2025. Although this standard would technically equate to a 54.5 mpg fuel economy standard, the EPA and the NHTSA expect to reduce CO2 emissions in other ways, such as by achieving reductions in air conditioning leakage.
While few can argue with the objective of the new standards to reduce the country’s costly and environmentally-taxing fuel consumption, safety advocates and lawyers in California and elsewhere were initially concerned that the incidence of serious or fatal personal injury in traffic accidents would rise, as it had in the three-plus decades after the federal government implemented the nation’s first vehicle fuel economy standards.
In response to the Arab oil embargo from 1973 to 1974, Congress passed the Energy Policy Conservation Act in 1975, which established the first CAFE standards for passenger cars and light trucks. By 1985, the government hoped to double new car fuel efficiency.
A perhaps unexpected consequence of the new CAFE standards was the rise in the incidence of injuries and fatalities in auto accidents. To meet the standards, auto manufacturers opted to make smaller vehicles, with the average car shedding 500 pounds by 1985, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS). Reduced weight and size translated to a higher risk of injury in a crash: in a collision between a large and small vehicle, the large vehicle would push the smaller one back on impact, inflicting more force on its occupants. IIHS estimates that there was a 23 percent increase in fatalities per every 10,000 registered cars.
Fortunately, the NHTSA and the EPA ensured carmakers would not simply produce smaller vehicles to comply with federal fuel efficiency standards. The new standards are based on the vehicle’s size, or footprint, so large vehicles have a numerically higher fuel economy standard than smaller ones. This will encourage auto manufacturers to create a variety of vehicles, thereby maintaining consumer choice and safety for those who opt for larger, heavier vehicles.
When it comes to vehicle size, the new CAFE standards are designed to accommodate large vehicles as well as small, ensuring that the safety of American drivers will not be compromised for greater fuel efficiency.
