The Trump administration wants to end California’s requirement for automakers to sell more electric cars in the state each year. America’s biggest automaker has a different idea: adopt the rule nationwide.
General Motors Co. plans to propose that federal regulators embrace a nationwide electric-car sales program starting in 2021, patterned on California’s so-called zero emission vehicle sales mandate that requires manufacturers to sell more EVs each year.
The plan, to be proposed in formal comments to regulators, is one of the clearest signs yet of auto industry opposition to the Trump administration’s proposal to cap federal fuel-economy requirements in 2020 and unwind California’s power to set its own vehicle efficiency standards and its zero-emission vehicle mandate. Honda Motor Co. also took exception to aspects of the Trump proposal.
The period for public comments to be filed ends at midnight on Friday.
“We know that we can do better” than the Trump proposal, Mark Reuss, GM’s executive vice president of global product development, told reporters in advance of the deadline. “We know that the industry can do better than that.”
GM says a nationwide program could put 7 million long-range electric cars on the road and slash 375 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions by 2030, compared with existing zero-emission vehicle mandates.
The Environmental Protection Agency and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in August recommended keeping federal fuel economy requirements at 37 miles per gallon from 2020 through 2026, instead of raising them to roughly 47 mpg by 2025 under rules by the Obama administration. The agencies also want to revoke California’s authority to adopt vehicle efficiency rules of its own, including its electric-car mandate.
The agencies said the proposal would reduce societal costs by as much as $500 billion over a number of years and highway deaths by as many as 1,000 per year, in part by making newer, safer autos more affordable. Industry experts and even some on the EPA staff have questioned aspects of the proposal.
While the auto industry sought relief from the Obama rules, carmakers view the Trump administration’s proposal as too aggressive. They fear it could force them to build vehicles for California and the 12 states that follow its standards, and another fleet for the rest of the nation, which Reuss said would be “very costly, and frankly unnecessary.”
Automakers also worry about a drawn-out court fight between Washington and Sacramento.