June 25, 2004ADVERTISING E.P.A. Energy-Saving Spots Give Cars Short ShriftBy DANNY HAKIM
DETROIT, June 24 - A new series of whimsical public service announcements from the Environmental Protection Agency are lampooning the notion that cars can be made more energy efficient while the ads encourage conservation at home.
A top E.P.A. official said the $1 million campaign was developed by a branch of the agency that specializes in energy-saving home appliances and was not intended to send a message about cars. But it comes at a time of heightened awareness of oil consumption and energy security, and despite the fact that many analysts say consumers can make their greatest single contribution to air quality when choosing a car.
It also comes less than two months after an E.P.A. report emphasized how much more fuel efficient new cars and trucks were in the mid-1980's. The E.P.A.'s transportation division was not consulted for the new public service announcements, the E.P.A. official, Brian McLean, said, despite the fact that a car plays a starring role.
In a 60-second version of the public service announcement, a woman named Suzanne says she is concerned about pollution and global warming, but laments the homegrown efforts of her husband, Mark, to cut emissions from the family car. Mark - nerdy, pudgy, harried - is shown rigging up their car, first with a sail, then a microwave contraption using huge satellite dishes, and finally a helium tank with a bulbous hose.
"The E.P.A. says the energy we use in our home can cause twice the greenhouse gases of a car," Suzanne says, adding that she has started buying energy-saving household products.
Buying a cleaner car, or say, a smaller sport utility vehicle, does not appear to be a viable alternative for reducing emissions. The ad ends with a shot of Mark pushing the car down a hill and Suzanne saying, "He still marches to the beat of a different drum." At one point, the car fills with helium, Mark starts talking like Mickey Mouse and two men in the backseat shake their heads and say "Genius!"
Indeed, as the E.P.A. says, energy use at home can cause twice the emissions of a single car. But most families have more than one car and emit roughly the same amount of global warming gases in their vehicles as in their homes, said David Friedman, senior policy analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists, an environmental research and advocacy group.
"With a car, you can cut your fuel use in half by using a hybrid," he said. "You're not likely to cut your electricity use in half by using more efficient appliances."
Mr. McLean, the E.P.A.'s director of the Office of Atmospheric Programs, said, "We were just trying to give people a benchmark."
"If you have two cars," he added, "they would be equal."
The ads were made by the New York office of Foote, Cone & Belding, part of the Interpublic Group of Companies. They promote the 12-year-old Energy Star program, which allows manufacturers to earn a special label if their products meet stringent emissions goals.
Mr. Friedman and other environmentalists praise the program, which is part of Mr. McLean's office. But they wonder why new public service announcements set up saving energy at home in opposition to saving energy on the road.
"The practical way to stop pollution is for the Bush administration to advance energy savings for homes without pushing the auto and oil industry's line that we can't improve pollution from cars," said Daniel Becker, director for the global-warming and energy program at the Sierra Club.
Mr. McLean said "many people are not aware that the things they do in their homes could have an effect on emissions."
"Its intent was to say, 'Did you know this?' " he added.
He said that the campaign was reviewed by various officials at E.P.A., but added: "There wasn't a lot of consultation with transportation on it. They don't consult with us about how to promote homes."
In a shorter version of the ad, Mark's car sails down the road - literally - while a narrator says, "there is a practical way to reduce air pollution." Viewers are then directed to a Web site that lists energy- efficient furnaces, computers and dishwashers - in fact, just about everything but cars.
The government does provide detailed information on emissions that come from the tailpipes of specific vehicle models, at the Web site www.fueleconomy.gov. For instance, most versions of the Ford Expedition emit more than 12 tons of global warming gases each year, in average driving conditions, according to the site. By contrast, the smaller Ford Escape S.U.V. emits just more than 9 tons a year.
In late April, the latest version of the E.P.A.'s annual fuel economy trends report showed that it would not take innovative technology - not to mention sails or microwaves - to improve vehicle efficiency. In fact, new cars and trucks would be 20 percent more fuel efficient if they simply had not become so much heavier and faster since the mid-1980's, the report's executive summary stated.
The ads underscore how far Washington has diverged from California and Canada on auto regulations. Last week, California released an initial draft of a plan to cut automotive emissions of global warming gases by nearly 30 percent, a strategy sharply different from that of the Bush administration, which has withdrawn from a global accord on curbing such emissions.
California, which has long battled smog, has the unique authority to set its own air quality rules, and other states are permitted to follow its air regulations.
Canada also appears poised for tougher auto regulations. This week, ahead of national elections next week, the Conservative Party joined a call by other parties for a 25 percent increase in Canada's fuel economy standards, which now mirror those of the United States.
― hstencil (hstencil), Friday, 25 June 2004 16:53 (twenty-one years ago)
― hstencil (hstencil), Friday, 25 June 2004 17:13 (twenty-one years ago)
from the NYT
E.P.A. Says 17 States Can’t Set Emission Rules for Cars
By JOHN M. BRODER and FELICITY BARRINGER WASHINGTON — The Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday denied California and 16 other states the right to set their own standards for carbon dioxide emissions from automobiles.
The E.P.A. administrator, Stephen L. Johnson, said the proposed California rules were pre-empted by federal authority and made moot by the energy bill signed into law by President Bush on Wednesday. Mr. Johnson said California had failed to make a compelling case that it needed authority to write its own standards for greenhouse gas emissions from cars and trucks to help curb global warming.
“The Bush administration is moving forward with a clear national solution, not a confusing patchwork of state rules,” Mr. Johnson said in an evening conference call with reporters. “I believe this is a better approach than if individual states were to act alone.”
Other states affected by the ruling included New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.
The decision immediately sparked a heated debate over its scientific basis and whether political pressure was applied by the automobile industry to help it escape the proposed California regulations. State officials and environmental groups vowed to sue to overturn the edict.
The 17 states had waited two years for the Bush administration to issue a ruling on an application to set stricter air quality standards than those adopted by the federal government. The denial of the request, technically known as a Clean Air Act waiver, is the first of more than 50 applications that the federal government has refused to allow California to set its own pollution rules.
The emissions standards California adopted in 2004 — but not been approved by the federal government — would have forced automakers to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 30 percent in new cars and light trucks by 2016, with the cutbacks to begin in 2009 models.
That would have translated into roughly 43 miles per gallon for cars and some light trucks and about 27 miles per gallon for heavier trucks and sport utility vehicles.
The new federal law will require automakers to meet a 35-mile-per-gallon fleetwide standard for cars and trucks sold in the United States by 2020. It does not address carbon dioxide emissions, but such emissions would be reduced as cars were forced to become more fuel efficient.
California’s proposed rules had sought to address the impact of carbon dioxide and other pollutants from cars and trucks that scientists say contribute to the warming of the planet.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California said the states would go to federal court to reverse the E.P.A. decision.
“It is disappointing that the federal government is standing in our way and ignoring the will of tens of millions of people across the nation,” Mr. Schwarzenegger said. “We will continue to fight this battle.”
He added, “California sued to compel the agency to act on our waiver, and now we will sue to overturn today’s decision and allow Californians to protect our environment.”
Twelve other states — New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington — had proposed standards like California’s, and the governors of Arizona, Colorado, Florida and Utah have said they would do the same.
If the waiver had been granted and the 16 other states had adopted the California standard, it would have covered at least half of all vehicles sold in America.
Automakers praised the decision. “We commend E.P.A. for protecting a national, 50-state program,” said David McCurdy, president of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers. “Enchancing energy security and improving fuel economy are priorities to all automakers, but a patchwork quilt of inconsistent and competing fuel economy programs at the state level would only have created confusion, inefficiency and uncertainty for automakers and consumers.”
In recent weeks, the chief executives of the Detroit auto companies were in Washington to lobby for less-stringent regulations.
Industry analysts and environmental groups said the E.P.A. decision had the appearance of a reward to the industry, in return for dropping its opposition to the energy legislation. Auto industry leaders issued statements supporting the new energy law, which gives them more time to improve fuel economy than California would have.
State officials reacted with dismay. The California attorney general, Edmund G. Brown Jr., called the decision “absurd.” He said it ignored a long history of waivers granted California to deal with its special topographical, climate and transportation circumstances, which require tougher standards than those set nationally. Mr. Brown noted that federal courts in California and Vermont upheld the California standards this year against challenges by the auto industry.
Senator Dianne Feinstein, the California Democrat, said: “I find this disgraceful. The passage of the energy bill does not give the E.P.A a green light to shirk its responsibility to protect the health and safety of the American people from air pollution.”
Representative Henry A. Waxman, Democrat of California and chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said the decision defied law, science and common sense. He said his committee would investigate how the decision had been made and would seek to reverse it.
Richard Blumenthal, the attorney general of Connecticut, said, “The excuses for this mockery of law and sound public policy are like the outworn treads on automobiles, and the administration will be no more successful in court on this issue than it has been in a string of decisions in our challenges against it.”
Andrew M. Cuomo, the New York attorney general, said the state would challenge the decision.
Mr. Johnson, the E.P.A. administrator, cited federal law, not science, as the underpinning of his decision. “Climate change affects everyone regardless of where greenhouse gases occur, so California is not exclusive,” he said.
Mary Nichols, the head of the California Air Resources Board, which had geared up to enforce the proposed emissions rules on 2009-model cars, said the reasoning was flawed. “Thirty-five miles per gallon is not the same thing as a comprehensive program for reducing greenhouse gases,” Ms. Nichols said.
David Doniger, a lawyer for the Natural Resources Defense Council, said the decision was scientifically and legally indefensible. Since 1984, Mr. Doniger said, the agency has not distinguished between local, national and international air pollution.
“All the smog problems that California has are shared with other states, just like the global warming problems they have are shared with other states,” he said.
Danny Hakim and Micheline Maynard contributed reporting.
wtf
― Z S, Thursday, 20 December 2007 03:40 (eighteen years ago)
People in my public policy program are always kind of amazed that I don't want to work at the EPA. I love reading these two quotes directly after each other:
EPA Croney: "“The Bush administration is moving forward with a clear national solution, not a confusing patchwork of state rules"
Automaker Croney: "...a patchwork quilt of inconsistent and competing fuel economy programs at the state level would only have created confusion, inefficiency and uncertainty for automakers and consumers.”
― Z S, Thursday, 20 December 2007 03:42 (eighteen years ago)
Can anyone imagine being confused by their state's fuel economy program?
― Z S, Thursday, 20 December 2007 03:43 (eighteen years ago)
last-gasp bullshit of the lame duck crime syndicate
― El Tomboto, Thursday, 20 December 2007 04:22 (eighteen years ago)
I mean, I have no idea what my response to this kind of thing should be anymore. 100% of appointees under the Bush administration revealed to be thoroughly incompetent, totally unqualified, and entirely under the thumb of any and all lobbies favoring the administration; not a surprise, nothing we can do but wait it out until they're all back working in think tanks or other good ol' boy front businesses. Fuck it, sick of caring.
― El Tomboto, Thursday, 20 December 2007 04:25 (eighteen years ago)
states: "we need strong standards and guidelines"
fed gov: "ok" (dithers for years)
states: "we mean it"
fed gov: "yeah yeah, in a minute!! jeez"
states: "i'm waaaaiiting"
fed gov: "would you shut up already?"
states: "fine, we're doing it ourselves"
fed gov: "who can comprehend this crazy patchwork of different rules?"
― Tracer Hand, Thursday, 20 December 2007 10:52 (eighteen years ago)
Hang on, hasn't California been doing this for years. Setting the most stringent standards and auto industry abiding by them because it's the largest single auto market.
― Ed, Thursday, 20 December 2007 11:00 (eighteen years ago)