Automakers may forego as much as $4 billion a year in light truck sales to prevent states led by California from setting their own mileage standards, Bloomberg reported Tuesday.
The Environmental Protection Agency is proposing that automakers boost the average fuel economy of their fleets to 47 to 62 mpg by 2025.
Last fall, EPA announced the first-ever standards to improve fuel efficiency of heavy-duty trucks and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which are scheduled to take effect in the 2014 model year, with a second round of targets in place in 2018.
Automakers may need to agree to the higher standard to prevent 13 states that account for 34% of new-vehicle sales from setting even stricter ones, according to Sean McAlinden, chief economist at the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich., Bloomberg reported.
A deal would lead to higher market share for small cars and electric vehicles, and fewer truck sales and total new vehicle sales, McAlinden and other analysts predicted.
EPA, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and California have set a Sept. 1 date to issue the proposed rules, Bloomberg reported.
California agreed not to use a waiver of greenhouse-gas emission standards received from EPA in 2009, as part of a compromise that set a national mileage standard of 35.5 mph by 2016. The state has not agreed to forgo its waiver for rules after 2016.
