WASHINGTON – The Biden administration is planning some of the most stringent auto pollution limits in the world, designed to ensure that all-electric cars make up 67 percent of all new passenger vehicles. goes on sale nationwide by 2032, according to two people familiar. with problem.
That would represent a giant leap for the United States – where only 5.8% of cars sold last year were all electric — and would go beyond President Biden’s earlier ambition to have all-electric cars make up half of all auto sales nationally by 2030.
This will be the federal government’s most aggressive climate regulation and will push the United States to the forefront of a global effort to cut greenhouse gases produced by cars, a major cause of climate change. . The European Union has enacted vehicle emissions standards that are expected to phase out the sale of new gasoline-powered vehicles by 2035. Canada and the UK have proposed similar standards as the European model. Europe.
At the same time, the proposed regulation would pose a significant challenge for automakers. Nearly every major auto company has invested heavily in electric vehicles, but few have committed to the levels the Biden administration envisioned. And many have faced supply chain issues that have brought production to a halt. Even manufacturers enthusiastic about EVs aren’t sure if consumers will buy enough to account for the majority of new car sales within a decade.
Action from the EPA will likely excite climate activists who are angered by the Biden administration’s actions. recent decision to approve a huge oil drilling project on federal land in Alaska. Some in the administration argue that accelerating the transition to renewable energy, with most Americans driving electric cars, will reduce demand for oil drilled in Alaska or elsewhere.
Michael S. Regan, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, is expected to announce the proposed limits on exhaust emissions on Wednesday in Detroit. These requirements are intended to ensure that electric cars account for 54 to 60 percent of all new cars sold in the United States by 2030, with that number growing to 64 to 67 percent of new car sales by 2032 , according to people familiar with the details, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the information has not been made public.
Accelerating electric vehicle use in the United States will require other important changes, including the construction of millions of new electric vehicle charging stations, an overhaul of the grid to meet the energy needs of those chargers, and secure supplies of minerals and other things. Materials needed for batteries.
The Biden Administration’s Environmental Agenda
The proposed regulation, which will go through a public comment period and could be changed by the government before becoming official, will inevitably face regulatory challenges. It could also become an issue during the 2024 presidential campaign, as a future administration could undo or weaken it.
“This is a big job,” said John Bozzella, president of the Alliance for Automotive Innovation, which represents major U.S. and foreign automakers. “It’s not a complete transformation of the auto industry base and the auto market.”
In a statement released Friday night, Maria Michalos, an EPA spokeswoman, did not confirm the new goals but said the agency was working on new standards as directed by the president to ” accelerate the transition to a zero-emissions transportation future that protects people and the planet.”
The new regulations will come in after the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, which has helped stimulate demand for electric vehicles by providing tax incentives of up to $7,500 to car buyers as well as billions Incentive dollars for battery manufacturing, processing and mining of important minerals.
Transportation is the largest source of greenhouse gases produced by the United States, the second largest source of pollution on the planet after China. Rapidly phasing out gasoline-powered cars with electric models will help Mr. Biden meet his pledge to cut the country’s emissions in half by 2030 and effectively eliminate them by mid-century.
The proposed automobile emission regulation is even stricter than the targetBiden’s aid in his 2021 White House speech. Speaking on the South Lawn and surrounded by a line of electric vehicles, including the Ford F-150 Lightning, Chevrolet Bolt EV and Jeep Wrangler, Mr. Biden issued an executive order calling for federal policies to ensure that half of all new cars sold will be fully electric by 2030.
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“There’s a vision of the future that’s now starting to happen, a future of the electric auto industry – battery electric, plug-in hybrid, fuel cell electric,” Biden said at the time. that point.
But climate policy experts have said the transition to zero-emission vehicles must happen faster to avert a planetary catastrophe. The International Energy Agency’s 2021 report found that countries would have to stop selling new gasoline-powered cars by 2035 to keep average global temperatures from rising 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels . Beyond that point, scientists say, the effects of catastrophic heatwaves, floods, droughts, crop failures and species extinction will become significantly harder on humanity. The planet has warmed by an average of 1.1 degrees Celsius.
Drew Kodjak, executive director of the International Council on Clean Transport, a research organization, said that while the market has already begun to transition to electric vehicles, government action needs to be taken to ensure the vehicle revolution. electricity is completed. “Anyone who has seen this film knows that the market is very fickle,” Mr. Kodjak said. “What if the market crashes? What if the minerals in the battery do not run out? Without solid standards with a clear trajectory in time, no player can be certain that this will happen.”
The proposed rule would not require electric vehicles to account for a certain number or percentage of sales. Instead, it would require automakers to make sure the total number of vehicles they sell each year doesn’t exceed certain emissions limits. That limit would be so strict that it would force automakers to ensure that two-thirds of the cars they sell are all-electric by 2032, according to people familiar with the matter.
Experts say the proposed regulation would synchronize federal action with a move by California to ban the sale of new gasoline-powered cars after 2035. Even manufacturers who oppose the regulations say they’d rather deal with a set of rules than meet specifications from California that differ from those required of the federal.
However, there are still many obstacles to a smooth transition to electric vehicles. One of the biggest problems is the need for millions of electric vehicle charging stations. Experts say electric vehicles won’t be able to go from niche to mainstream without making electric charging stations as ubiquitous as corner gas stations. The infrastructure law of 2021 provides $7.5 billion to build a network of about 500,000 charging stations along interstate highways, but January report from S&P Global concluded that millions are needed.
The transition could also cause economic turmoil for American auto workers, as electric vehicles require less than half the labor to build a gasoline-powered vehicle.
“We’ve addressed job loss through technology in the past, but when you talk about the speed of this, it’s hard to understand that we’re not going to lose jobs,” he said. Mark DePaoli, a United Auto worker Local 600 executive, said in a recent interview at union headquarters near the Ford Rouge manufacturing plant in Dearborn, Mich.
Losing auto jobs could have political consequences for Mr. Biden, who will need voters in industrialized states like Michigan and Ohio if he chooses to run for a second term. As they worked on the new regulation, administration officials held weekly phone calls with union leaders to try to reassure them.
Mr. Biden, a “car guy” who describes himself as “the most pro-union guy you’ll ever see,” has repeatedly tried to present the transition as an economic opportunity, insisting that it will create new jobs in a century. clean energy economy.
“We will build a different future with one – a future with clean energy, high paying jobs,” Biden said. said in a speech last summer. “We must continue to retain and hire union builders and electricians for jobs in wind, solar, hydrogen, nuclear, creating more and better jobs.”
Mr. Biden has worked to ensure that only US-made electric cars are eligible for the tax incentives offered by the Inflation Reduction Act — despite the requirement that they be assembled by companies. union workers were eliminated.
