The Obama administration has set some excellent goals for CAFE standards. Excellent, that is, when compared with where auto emissions goals had previously been set.
After months of hand-wringing by industry lobbies and environmental groups, President Obama announced the new round of Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards, known as CAFE, on Friday in Washington. The standards call for a 5 percent annual increase in fuel economy for passenger cars from 2017 to 2025, culminating in a mandated 54.5 miles per gallon.
Good, but take a look around -- we're already in it. We're already in the throes of global warming. Several years ago, IPCC scientists urged that we should make very serious changes before 2012 or else the climate crisis would be unavoidable. Yet several months out from that deadline, we're not even close.