Give Me Mileage or Give Me Death

In case you missed the news the Bush administration bowed to consumer dissatisfaction with the outrageous cost of operating a vehicle, and announced new standards for mileage of minivans, SUVs, and Trucks.  (For information about exactly how the standards break down click here.)  In summary the new standards would require an average of 24 MPG among these vehicles, up from the current 21.  Now, any improvement is good, but here is the part that makes these standards laughable: the standards don’t fully take effect until the 2011 model year. 

So what does the auto industry think of this?  Monica Sakala of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers stated that the standards “will be a challenge for the industry”.  Come on.  It’s not like you couldn’t see this one coming.  Manufacturers of light trucks have been talking about implementing all manner of fuel saving features for a decade now.  Kudos to General Motors and Chrysler; they will have displacement on demand systems in many of their vehicles for 2006.  GM has even developed hybrid versions of their full-sized trucks for the 2006 model year.  These technologies will, almost surely, place GM in compliance with the new standards five years ahead of schedule. 

Some changes, such as displacement on demand systems, would be relatively easy to implement as similar technology has existed for quite a while.  Cadillac introduced its Northstar system (now available in several GM vehicles) in the early 90’s, which utilized similar technology, albeit for a different purpose.  Again, anyone who reads the automotive press heard about this type of system five years ago; it requires little more than a reworking of the engine control computer. 

So my response is that small improvements are better than none, but if we must take baby steps, let’s take them quickly.  How about requiring a ten percent improvement every model year?  Continuous improvement - what a concept.  That’s it for now, I told you it would be short.