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The Biden administration proposed strict new auto emissions rules on Wednesday aimed at accelerating the U.S. electric vehicle transition with the goal of having EVs account for up to 67% of all new vehicles sold by 2032.

The proposed standards, which President Joe Biden ordered the Environmental Protection Agency to craft in an August 2021 executive order under the Clean Air Act, will apply to passenger vehicles beginning in model year 2027 and extending through model year 2032.

While the EPA’s proposed rule would not mandate or require automakers to sell a certain number of EVs, it would restrict the total level of emissions generated by each company’s total fleet of sold cars , which is essentially another way of restricting internal combustion engine-powered vehicle sales.

The transportation sector generates the largest share of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States, according to the EPA, accounting for 27% of total greenhouse gas emissions as of 2020.

The guidance from the Biden administration includes four different emissions-limiting options for the EPA to choose from following a public comment period, an effort to allow some degree of flexibility for the EPA in moving to adopt the proposed guidelines.

It is unlikely the regulation will be finalized until next year.

Still, the targets are ambitious. Even the most modest option would require at least 54% of new car sales in the U.S. to be zero-emissions vehicles by 2030, an increase of 4% compared to the administration's existing target, which already seeks to ensure EVs represent 50% of new cars sold by 2030.

By 2032, the new proposed rule would increase that target from between 64% and 67%.

EVs made up just 5.8% of new U.S. vehicle sales in 2022.

The proposal is likely to generate some backlash from the auto industry, which until now has attempted to work with the Biden administration.

The Alliance for Automotive Innovation released a memo ahead of the anticipated guidance last week.

It noted that while automakers are committed to electrifying their fleets and reaching net-zero carbon technology, a "clear-eyed assessment of market readiness is required."

"Even with positive EV sales momentum and product excitement, there are challenges to the electrification transition ahead," it said. "This requires a massive, 100-year change to the U.S. industrial base and the way Americans drive."

The Biden administration's proposal comes after California air regulators voted last year to require 100% zero-emissions vehicle sales by 2035.

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Originally posted by Dakor:
The President isn't King. Congress dictates Commerce not the President. This dictate won't go anywhere.

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The transportation sector generates the largest share of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States, according to the EPA, accounting for 27% of total greenhouse gas emissions as of 2020.

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People are not buying EV’s like expected

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The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday dealt a major blow to the Environmental Protection Agency's power to regulate carbon emissions that cause climate change. The decision by the conservative court majority sets the stage for further limitations on the regulatory power of other agencies as well.

By a vote of 6 to 3, the court said that any time an agency does something big and new – in this case addressing climate change – the regulation is presumptively invalid, unless Congress has specifically authorized regulating in this sphere.

"That's a very big deal because they're not going to get it from Congress because Congress is essentially dysfunctional," said Harvard law professor Richard Lazarus, an expert on environmental law. "This could not have come at a worse time" because "the consequences of climate change are increasingly dire and we're running out of time to address it."

As Case Western Reserve professor Jonathan Adler put it, "The Court is definitely sending a signal to regulatory agencies more broadly that they only have the power that Congress delegated to them, and that agencies need to think twice before they try to pour new wine out of old bottles."

In other words, an agency "can't simply retrofit an old statute to create new tools or new mechanisms" to address a problem that is generally within the agency's jurisdiction.

In terms of climate change, Lazarus believes it will have an immediate effect. "Remember when Joe Biden was elected he said we're going to use a whole big government approach to climate change, not just EPA regulation. Well, that whole government approach may now find itself under a cloud of this court's opinion."

The issue before the court was how the EPA can regulate coal-fired power plants, which in this country are the single largest source of carbon emissions that cause climate challenge. The Obama administration set state-by-state carbon limits and encouraged states to rely less on coal and more on alternative energy sources. Even though the program was blocked by the courts, it met its targets 11 years ahead of schedule for the simple reason that it turned out coal was too expensive compared to other power generating sources.

But on Thursday, the Supreme Court turned thumbs down on any such systemic approach. Bringing to life what the court has called "the major questions doctrine," the court said that neither the EPA nor any other agency may adopt rules that are transformational to the economy--unless Congress has specifically authorized such a rule to address a specific problem, like climate change.

Writing for the court majority, Chief Justice John Roberts said that under what the court has recently called the "major questions doctrine," neither the EPA nor any other agency may adopt rules that are "transformational" to the economy — unless Congress has specifically authorized such a transformative rule to address a specific problem, like climate change.

In "certain extraordinary cases, both separation of powers principles and a practical understanding of legislative intent make us 'reluctant to read into ambiguous statutory text' the delegation claimed to be lurking there," Roberts writes. "To convince us otherwise, something more than a merely plausible textual basis for the agency action is necessary. The agency instead must point to 'clear congressional authorization' for the power it claims."

Justice Elena Kagan, in a furious dissent, said essentially that the Court is making up new rules that contradict nearly a century of regulatory law. The text of the Clean Air Act, she said, clearly anticipates that the EPA will have to deal with new problems and uses broad language to allow that. The Court majority, she says, "does not have a clue about how to address climate change...yet it appoints itself, instead of congress or the expert agency...the decision-maker on climate policy. I cannot think of many things more frightening." NPR Link

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Each time EPA has tried to regulate vehicle emissions, its efforts have been met with challenges in federal court. The agency’s expected proposal this week to boost electric vehicle deployment is unlikely to be any different.

But this time around, EPA has a new tool in its legal arsenal to defend its attempt to tackle one of the nation’s leading sources of planet-warming emissions — the freshly minted Inflation Reduction Act.

The landmark climate law passed in 2022 is expected to buffer EPA’s anticipated regulation against scrutiny from a federal judiciary where conservative jurists — particularly at the Supreme Court — are increasingly skeptical of agencies seizing power that hasn’t been specifically delegated to them by Congress.


“It’s Congress directly weighing in to provide direct support for zero-emitting vehicles,” said Peter Zalzal, senior counsel at the Environmental Defense Fund, of the Inflation Reduction Act.

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Originally posted by Hamden106:
Looking forward to being the 4th car in line for a 30 minute e-fill.
Not to mention the call to EEE for an emergency can of electrons high in the Rockies.

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The transportation sector generates the largest share of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States, according to the EPA, accounting for 27% of total greenhouse gas emissions as of 2020.

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Originally posted by 6guns:
We have problems with our grid nowadays, never mind they keep trying to push bullshit "green" power generation. If they get their way, we're screwed!