The Oil Industry's Covert Campaign To Rewrite American Car Emissions Rules (nytimes.com)

When the Trump administration laid out a plan this year that would eventually allow cars to emit more pollution, automakers, the obvious winners from the proposal, balked. The changes, they said, went too far even for them. But it turns out that there was a hidden beneficiary of the plan that was pushing for the changes all along: the nation's oil industry. From an investigation by The New York Times: In Congress, on Facebook and in statehouses nationwide, Marathon Petroleum, the country's largest refiner, worked with powerful oil-industry groups and a conservative policy network financed by the billionaire industrialist Charles G. Koch to run a stealth campaign to roll back car emissions standards, a New York Times investigation has found. The campaign's main argument for significantly easing fuel efficiency standards -- that the United States is so awash in oil it no longer needs to worry about energy conservation -- clashed with decades of federal energy and environmental policy.

"With oil scarcity no longer a concern," Americans should be given a "choice in vehicles that best fit their needs," read a draft of a letter that Marathon helped to circulate to members of Congress over the summer. Official correspondence later sent to regulators by more than a dozen lawmakers included phrases or sentences from the industry talking points, and the Trump administration's proposed rules incorporate similar logic. The industry had reason to urge the rollback of higher fuel efficiency standards proposed by former President Barack Obama. A quarter of the world's oil is used to power cars, and less-thirsty vehicles mean lower gasoline sales.

Comments

Who worries about scarcity?

[Anonymous Coward]

With oil scarcity no longer a concern

Conveniently omitting to mention pollution and greenhouse gas emissions as remaining concerns.

Re:Who worries about scarcity?

[bobbied]

With oil scarcity no longer a concern

Conveniently omitting to mention pollution and greenhouse gas emissions as remaining concerns.

I would like to point out that this USED to be a question of national security too. Because the nation's infrastructure ran on oil and we used more than we produced, we where at high risk if there where supply disruption, say because of some bad things happening half a world away. So, the initial emission standards and mileage requirements where driven into regulations long before the Climate Change argument was a thing.

I know a lot of you folks didn't live though the oil embargo's of the 70's, when we got blessed with the 55 MPH speed limits and Jimmy Carter's national regulations that mandated how cold you could set the AC and how hot you could run the heater. I remember waiting in lines to get gas too.

So environmental concerns where only part of the reason we have the CAFE standards. Some of those reasons don't exist now.

The question is now that we have one less reason, does that justify relaxing the standards? Maybe, maybe not, but it sure makes it a harder sell to increase the CAFE mileage standards...

Re:It's not covert, they were over-bearing

[CohibaVancouver]

And just think of the increased revenue from gas taxes! That ought to soothe any ruffled liberal feathers.

Hey, gotta cover the shortfall from the Republican's trillion dollars added to the deficit.

Re:It's not covert, they were over-bearing

[Only Time Will Tell]

I am going to call bullshit on this. The proposed regulations were still on a path that was behind China, India, the EU, Japan, Korea, etc. The Obama regulations were still pretty weak compared to the world. Trump has knocked us down from being a C- student to a straight F. Source: https://www.nytimes.com/intera...

Oil scarcity

[93 Escort Wagon]

Implying that "oil scarcity" is the reason behind these regulations seems like such an obvious straw man that at first I figured everyone would see through it immediately... but then I realized this letter was targeted at Congress.

Re:Root cause

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do you hate capitalism?

Because:

We have a culture where we tolerate lying when someone is trying to make a quick buck.

Through that culture we've mostly destroyed society. As "quick bucks" becomes more important than saving lives, educating our young, researching new technologies, medicine, and societal improvements, our standard of living, and our relationships with each other.

Greed is a sin for a reason. Enshrining it as the core defining aspect of our society was a mistake. A mistake we are all paying for constantly.

Re:Root cause

[filekutter]

Capitalism is an economic system that is attempting to insinuate itself into democracy and transform how the country is governed. Period. Capitalism supports the unmitigated accumulation of money. If you insinuate these values into a democratic social system you become a corporate oligarchy. Corporations do not care about people, they care about profits. Period. This is not a system that is good for societies.