The average American spends 2 ½ hours a day in the car. That’s about 73,000 hours in a lifetime—and tons of havoc wreaked on the environment. The transportation sector is the fastest growing single source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the country, which pollute the air and contribute to global warming.

Tackling this challenge means both reducing the amount of driving by smarter development and building transit and reducing the pollution pouring out of each car. Four out of five of the New England states did the next best thing—reduced the amount that cars would be allowed to pollute in the first place.

Yesterday, the Obama Administration adopted those regulations nationwide, unveiling the first-ever federal clean cars standard that will limit the maximum level of GHGs that can be emitted by new cars and trucks. The new laws are expected to cut GHG emissions from new cars by 34 percent between models made in 2009 and those made in 2016—a change equivalent to taking 21.4 million of today’s cars off the road.

This decision is a major victory for CLF. When it comes to clean cars, we’ve been here since the beginning. For two decades CLF has fought for stronger limits on tailpipe emissions from cars.

Early national tailpipe emissions and fuel efficiency standards adopted in the 1960s and 70s improved the fuel economy of the average American vehicle from 13 miles per gallon in 1975 to 22.6 mpg in 1987 and began the process of reducing pollution from cars. Over the course of the 1980’s and 1990’s CLF worked in New England to ensure that our states in partnership with California would lead the nation in a journey towards lower emissions cars.

That journey took a new and interesting path in 2002 when the state of California adopted the Pavley standards, also known as the California Clean Car Standards, which set stringent emission standards for global warming pollutants  from cars.

CLF participated in the California process, urging that the standards be written in a manner that would allow them to be implemented in our states.  Once the standards were in place CLF then, working with allies in many states, launched a largely successful effort to get the standards adopted in the New England states.

It wasn’t easy. The automakers fought back by suing in both California and in New England. CLF served as “local counsel” to a coalition of environmental groups as we all worked with the states to achieved victory in two landmark cases in Vermont and Rhode Island in 2008, forcing automakers to comply with state emissions regulations and in effect implementing the “clean cars program” in every New England state except New Hampshire.

The momentum from the legal victories in Vermont and Rhode Island, as well as the parallel victory our allies achieved in court in California, provided key fuel for the effort that led to the adoption of those state standards on the national level.

But the work’s not done. Today, CLF is focused on pushing hard for the adoption and implementation of a Northeast/Mid-Atlantic Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) to gradually lower the carbon content of fuel. In 2008, CLF successfully worked with the governors of 11 northeast and mid-Atlantic states as they formulated and signed an agreement in which they pledged to develop an LCFS in the future.

CLF also continues to aggressively protect the right of the states to develop a statewide LCFS, and deter opponents who could threaten the longevity of those standards. CLF served as a third party legal counsel on behalf of the state of California in federal litigation challenging the state’s precedent-setting LCFS. Lastly, CLF is forcefully engaging with congressional staff, senators and representatives to fend off federal legislation that would thwart the ability of the states to continue to lead the LCFS effort and the next generation of car standards.

President Obama’s adoption of the California standards nationwide, ending a longtime battle between states and automakers, demonstrated to us at CLF that what happens here in New England really can serve as a model for other states, and that states have the power to create momentum for sweeping change that can influence policy on the federal level. CLF is proud that New England continues to lead the nation in taking action to identify and solve environmental problems and will continue to fight to ensure the states have, and use, the tools to provide a powerful model for national action.

CLF in the News:

New Federal Car Emissions Standards Hailed in Maine, Anne Mostue, MPBN
White House Follows Vermont’s Lead on Clean Cars, Paul Burns, vtdigger.org

Environmentalists tend to be the kind of people who hang on to things.  Keenly aware of the impact of constantly buying new things – whether it be cars, appliances or other “hard goods” – the kind of folks who are CLF members (and are likely reading this) tend to avoid buying new things.  This is especially true where buying something new, like a new car, simply means shifting the use of the old item to someone else.  Driving a new efficient hybrid car is not a satisfying experience if you are aware that your older, less efficient car, will end up back on the road.

However, if you own an older car and want to move to a newer more efficient model while being sure that your old car will be scrapped and taken off the road the Federal Government has a deal for you.

Here are the basic rules for the program, as presented by the Feds:

• Your vehicle must be less than 25 years old on the trade-in date
• Only purchase or lease of new vehicles qualify
• Generally, trade-in vehicles must get 18 or less MPG (some very large pick-up trucks and cargo vans have different requirements)
• Trade-in vehicles must be registered and insured continuously for the full year preceding the trade-in
• You don’t need a voucher, dealers will apply a credit at purchase
• Program runs through Nov 1, 2009 or when the funds are exhausted, whichever comes first.
• The program requires the scrapping of your eligible trade-in vehicle, and that the dealer disclose to you an estimate of the scrap value of your trade-in. The scrap value, however minimal, will be in addition to the rebate, and not in place of the rebate.

Fortunately, the supply of cleaner and more efficient cars available for sale continues to expand, thanks in large part to the rules requiring a shift in the new car fleet mandated by the rules adopted by the Northeastern states (following the lead of California).   We are proud to note that CLF played a key role in defending those rules in court.

Update (August 6, 2009):

Unless you have been living in a cave you will have heard that the program is on the verge of running out of money and efforts are being made to “refuel it”.

Attempts at looking at the potential environmental benefits of the program range from the skeptical to the mildly positive to the fiercely negative.  A good middle ground was the comment of a leading environmental lawyer reported by CNET News:

“It’s not that it’s a bad idea; just don’t sell it as a cost-effective energy savings method,” Michael Gerrard, director of the Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University said in an academic journal. “From an economic standpoint it seems to be a roaring success. From an environment and energy perspective, it’s not where you would put your first dollar.”

The critiques of the program have some serious validity.  Would it be better for this money to be spent on public transit operations ?  Would a fundamental change in the funding paradigm that would shift money from roads to transit (as CLF has called for in our Five Steps for the Next Five Years climate vision document) be much better? Absolutely yes.

But my pragmatic bottom line is that this program has far more environmental benefit than so many other things the Federal government does and pays for that it is hard to get worked up about this one.