Comment by chrissnell
8 years ago
Not true--when CA imposes new emissions or efficiency regulations, the automakers are forced to comply to keep access to that huge market. Not wanting to design two different vehicles, they simply comply and pass the cost along to all of the buyers, whether they live in CA or not. The rest of the country has no way to directly affect the CARB's decisions. This exemption, therefore, is very unfair for the rest of us. The administration's policy could have significant impact on the price of vehicles for the rest of us. My diesel truck, for example, has several thousand dollars worth of emissions equipment that my state does not require. It's problematic and I'd love to skip it on my next purchase.
> It's problematic and I'd love to skip it on my next purchase.
I'd like you to go ahead and not pump a crapton of pollution into the air, thanks. Sorry for being so direct, and I would generally prefer to be more civil, but your comment strikes me as incredibly tone deaf and frankly, destructive. You are one inch away from advocating peeing in the swimming pool because it's cheaper than building toilets.
Since you probably haven’t owned a modern diesel vehicle I’ll tell you why owners don’t like the equipment on small vehicles. (Cars and light trucks)
It mostly comes down to the diesel particulate filter (DPF) that reduces visible soot. This is not really a problem outside some major cities.
Why don’t we like the DPF systems? Consider something like a VW Golf or Jetta TDI. With these systems you’re adding hundreds of pounds of extra dead weight, a regen cycle is required which wastes fuel by blowing it into the filter to regenerate. Combined, this wastes around 10-15%. The cherry on top is you cannot run blends of biodiesel higher than 15% or it ruins the DPF since it doesn’t volatilize like diesel does. Biodiesel is renewable and already comes with reduced emissions without extra controls.
I do give a bit of a shit about the environment and if given the option I would not have a DPF on a light diesel. I have a hard time seeing how decreased fuel mileage and a restriction on running renewables equals care for the environment.
Keep in mind, we removed sulfur from our on-road fuel in the US back in 2007 (way behind europe). This was a big help in allowing new catalyst controls to work as well as reduce conventional diesel pollution.
But yeah, this is not stuff most people consider or know about until they own a noxwagen after previously owning one of the pre-2007 tdi’s, read the bosch whitepapers on the controls, and have a dpf fail just outside federal emissions warranty (VW’s motto: If you can program it to cheat, you can program it to fail!)
EDIT: Forgot to mention the cost of just the DPF is usually $4-6k. It’s a huge failure component and I can’t recommend anyone purchase a lightt vehicle with one for city use as it won’t be able to properly regenerate and will fail early. Since the cost is that high the car/truck may be prematurely scrapped.
How available is biodiesel in the US? I"ve never seen it here in the UK, so it's not a consideration for me.
The DPF should be self cleaning if you do an occasional high-speed trip (such as on a highway), so it shouldn't be wasting fuel unless you're doing exclusively city driving (in which case I agree; petrol or electric is better in this situation).
Our 2016 Golf Bluemotion gets at least 50mpg in normal driving, usually over 60mpg, and occasionally we crack 70mpg.
1 reply →
Well, duh. Swimming pools are dual use.
The problematic equipment you're trying to dump also has a small benefit of helping the environment.
I really don't care how problematic you find it. No one should be forced to breathe your dangerous diesel particulate emissions regardless of which state you live in.
> automakers are forced to comply to keep access to that huge market
As has already been explained, this is false. These rules are for CARB states, not for California. California is in charge of working with the other states to set the rules.
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but don't the other states only have a say, and not a vote? It's ultimately California's decision what they must accept.
Edit: Looked it up, no other states have a vote. 12 governor appointed members and 2 elected members of the CARB board decide.
The other states can either accept the federal standard or the CARB standard. The states adopt the California standard because it’s better, not because the feds are forcing them.
The other states have the choice of the CARB standards or the EPA standards.
So your solution is to remove California's emissions standards, killing Angelenos with smog? What gives you the right to socialize the cost of your pollution?
CA is large but circa ~10% of national truck sales. 10% is no monopoly - hell the Texas truck market is at least twice the size of CA.
What's missing is the fact that 12 other states (the west coast and most of New England) have voluntarily agreed to adopt California's standards. So yes, the rest of the country does have influence, and they're wielding that influence on California's side.
Nobody is being "forced" to comply. Instead CA's standards are reasonable enough that it's more economical to implement them nationally than to build two models.
So you're mad that CA is socializing the side-effects of their regulation because you'd like to socialize the costs of your pollution?
The phrases you're searching for are "state's rights" and "free market capitalism."
No one is forced to do anything. Car manufacturers have the privilege of selling in California if they follow California's rules. They have decided that the privilege is worth standardizing emissions requirements everywhere in the united states.
I am going against my rhetoric against Trump, but to be fair: they have standardized production lines. This is possibly a downfall of Fordism and mass manufacturing in general.
> This is possibly a downfall of Fordism and mass manufacturing in general.
I don't think "Car manufacturers have to make cars better for everybody, not just some people" will lead to the downfall of mass manufacturing.