We've been receiving warning signs since last year predicting that the Biden administration, through the auspices of the Department of Transportation in concert with the Environmental Protection Agency, would be issuing new emissions standards for gas-powered vehicles in the United States. The new standard would demand much higher mileage for new vehicles and even lower emissions levels. The standards were ridiculous and the automotive industry began balking at the predicted numbers immediately. That didn't slow down Team Biden, however, or at least not very much. The new standards were announced yesterday and while they are marginally lower than the original projections, they are still far beyond simply being "ambitious." (Washington Examiner)

The Biden administration on Friday finalized new fuel economy standards for SUVs and trucks, easing off its initial proposals to better reflect the state of U.S. auto sales and the slower-than-expected pace of electric vehicle adoption.

The final rule, published by the Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, requires all light-duty vehicles to average 50.4 miles per gallon by 2031 — slightly less stringent than its 55.7 mpg target proposed last year.

Light-duty vehicles currently average around 39.1 miles per gallon, meaning the new requirements amount to an annual increase of roughly 2% per year. 

SUVs and pickup trucks will also not be required to increase their fuel economy standards between model years 2027 and 2028.

Biden's team had originally proposed demanding that light-duty cars reach 55.7 miles-per-gallon efficiency by 2031. They have now backed that figure off to 50.4. New American cars currently average roughly 39 miles per gallon, so that would represent an increase of twelve mpg (nearly one-third) in just seven years. That is simply insane. Most auto producers either won't be able to hit those numbers or they will have to increase the cost of the vehicles to ludicrous levels to make it happen. 

The same goes for pickup trucks and SUVs. The White House originally wanted them to reach 52 mpg by 2031. Now the figure has been reduced to 45 mpg. But that's still an increase of 10 mpg for larger engines that currently only average 35 mpg. Do these politicians know anything about how the auto industry works? I realize we have Pothole Pete Buttigieg running the DoT, but they really need to be speaking to some automotive engineers. Do these people honestly think that if Detroit knew of a way to affordably drive mileage levels that high right now they wouldn't have already done it? It would make their vehicles wildly more popular and competitive. 

Of course, none of this really has anything to do with efficiency, mileage, or saving the planet. When reporting on this story, the New York Times said the quiet part out loud in their headline and let the cat out of the green energy bag. The title currently reads, "U.S. Tightens Car Mileage Rules, Part of Strategy to Fight Climate Change." But that's not what the original title said. The more honest version, as seen here in the Wayback Machine, read, "Biden Administration Tightens Mileage Standards to Buoy E.V.s." That's a pretty massive change to a title, isn't it? That was the honest reason, of course, but apparently someone at the Times saw it and freaked out because you can't just go around telling the truth like that. 

Within fifteen minutes, (these are more Waback images) the new title was in place, but the subtitle still said that the change "is designed to encourage sales of electric vehicles and hybrids." By the time 90 minutes had passed, the subtitle had been replaced with "The new measure requires automakers to achieve an average of 65 miles per gallon for all the car models they sell by 2031."  Six more changes to the main body of the article were made between then and 2:30 this morning. And the hilarious part of all of this editing is that as of this writing, they have still left the 65 miles per gallon figure in the subtitle, which isn't even accurate. It's off by almost 15 mpg.

The main point here is that the original motivation cited by the Times is exactly what all of this has been about from the beginning. Biden's people don't give a flying fig about the climate beyond whatever votes they think it might win them on the far left. They are pushing these changes through at the DoT because they want to make gas-powered vehicles either impossible to produce or so expensive that people will see no alternative but to purchase an equally expensive electric vehicle. They haven't been able to convince most people or pressure them into making the switch, so they'll simply price most of you out of the gas-powered car market. Do you see how this works? Are you going to let them get away with it?