htc***
03-31-2010, 03:27 PM
Made in Washington: New Canadian fuel rules
Posted on March 30th 2010 by Jeremy Cato / Categories:
By the end of the week, the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama will give us details of the latest Canadian rules for new-vehicle fuel economy and reduced greenhouse-gas emissions.
The Obama people will actually unveil new U.S. rules, but because Ottawa has already said it will adhere to whatever Washington decides, what’s unveiled in Washington will apply in Canada. The overall goal of the proposed regulations is to boost the fleet-wide fuel economy of auto makers to an average of 6.7 litres/100 km or 35.5 miles per gallon and reduce carbon-dioxide emissions to an average of 250 grams per 1.6 km per vehicle by 2016.
Our government has decided to harmonize Canadian CAFE or Corporate Average Fuel Economy regulations with the American CAFE mandate. The idea is to prevent a patchwork of different regulations in Canada and the U.S.
But this approach also frees Ottawa of the burden of setting its own course. It’s a little rude to put it this way – and I am sure Ottawa types will say its an over-simplification -- but in essence, Ottawa here will just do whatever Washington tells it to do.
The truth is, Ottawa does quite a bit of this. Take vehicle safety. Transport Canada does some crash testing of new vehicles, but all the results are kept entirely secret. If Canadians want to know how robust a particular vehicle is in a crash, they need to surf over to the U.S. National Highway Transportation Safety Administration Web site for full details – or visit the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety for the results of its independent crash tests.
On recalls and safety investigations, Transport Canada does keep on online database that is available to the public, but the details are not nearly as rich as what you’ll find on the NHTSA site. The latter lists information about not only recalls, but ongoing safety investigations, too.
The NHTSA site also catalogues Technical Service Bulletins which highlight non-safety-related problems with vehicles. Consumers armed with TSBs can often get their cars fixed for free, where others cannot. Ottawa saves money and a lot of hassle by just leaving safety testing and information dissemination to the Americans.
The new fuel economy and emissions rules will dramatically alter what vehicles are offered for sale in Canada. But they are not being developed with any transparency in Canada – they are not being developed in Canada at all, in fact. All the juiciest backroom action between lobbyists, lawyers, company types and regulatory officials has long been happening in Washington.
Thus, public policy of high importance is not being done in public and not much is being done in Canada, either.
http://autos.sympatico.ca/Jeremy-Cato-Blog/3516/made-in-washington-new-canadian-fuel-rules
Posted on March 30th 2010 by Jeremy Cato / Categories:
By the end of the week, the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama will give us details of the latest Canadian rules for new-vehicle fuel economy and reduced greenhouse-gas emissions.
The Obama people will actually unveil new U.S. rules, but because Ottawa has already said it will adhere to whatever Washington decides, what’s unveiled in Washington will apply in Canada. The overall goal of the proposed regulations is to boost the fleet-wide fuel economy of auto makers to an average of 6.7 litres/100 km or 35.5 miles per gallon and reduce carbon-dioxide emissions to an average of 250 grams per 1.6 km per vehicle by 2016.
Our government has decided to harmonize Canadian CAFE or Corporate Average Fuel Economy regulations with the American CAFE mandate. The idea is to prevent a patchwork of different regulations in Canada and the U.S.
But this approach also frees Ottawa of the burden of setting its own course. It’s a little rude to put it this way – and I am sure Ottawa types will say its an over-simplification -- but in essence, Ottawa here will just do whatever Washington tells it to do.
The truth is, Ottawa does quite a bit of this. Take vehicle safety. Transport Canada does some crash testing of new vehicles, but all the results are kept entirely secret. If Canadians want to know how robust a particular vehicle is in a crash, they need to surf over to the U.S. National Highway Transportation Safety Administration Web site for full details – or visit the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety for the results of its independent crash tests.
On recalls and safety investigations, Transport Canada does keep on online database that is available to the public, but the details are not nearly as rich as what you’ll find on the NHTSA site. The latter lists information about not only recalls, but ongoing safety investigations, too.
The NHTSA site also catalogues Technical Service Bulletins which highlight non-safety-related problems with vehicles. Consumers armed with TSBs can often get their cars fixed for free, where others cannot. Ottawa saves money and a lot of hassle by just leaving safety testing and information dissemination to the Americans.
The new fuel economy and emissions rules will dramatically alter what vehicles are offered for sale in Canada. But they are not being developed with any transparency in Canada – they are not being developed in Canada at all, in fact. All the juiciest backroom action between lobbyists, lawyers, company types and regulatory officials has long been happening in Washington.
Thus, public policy of high importance is not being done in public and not much is being done in Canada, either.
http://autos.sympatico.ca/Jeremy-Cato-Blog/3516/made-in-washington-new-canadian-fuel-rules