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March 12, 2002
CAFE Defeat Saved Lives, Scholar Says
WASHINGTON--Sens. Tom Daschle, D-SD, and John Kerry, D-MA, conceded
today that they lacked the votes in the Senate to pass a major increase in
the corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) standards. Jerry Taylor,
director of natural resources studies at the Cato Institute, called it "a
tremendous victory for human health and the economy." He had the following
comments:
"Environmentalists who supported an expansion of CAFE standards for
cars and light trucks are allowing their hostility to energy use to
override their common sense. For instance, the National Academy of
Sciences reported last year that the current standards are directly
responsible for the deaths of 1,300 - 2,600 motorists a year. That's
because automakers find that the cheapest way of increasing fuel
efficiency is to reduce the size and weight of the cars they sell, making
them more dangerous to motorists in a crash. Dramatically expanding CAFE
standards would accelerate this trend and would directly result in the
deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Americans.
"While the costs of expanding CAFE standards is steep, the benefits are
ephemeral. Expanded standards certainly wouldn't reduce foreign oil
imports. For instance, since the CAFE standards were first introduced, the
average fuel economy more than doubled for new cars and grew by more than
50 percent for new light trucks, but imported oil has increased from 35 to
52 percent of U.S. consumption. Reducing oil demand would remove the most
expensive oil sources from the market first, and foreign oil is the
cheapest oil supply source in the world. Domestic producers, not foreign
oil producers, would be hit hardest if gasoline demand were to
decline.
"Nor would an expanded CAFE standard do much about global warming.
Gasoline consumption in the United States is only responsible for 1.5
percent of all human-related greenhouse gas emissions. The EPA reports
that expanded CAFE standards won't appreciably change that figure.
"If people want to drive fuel efficient cars, that's their right. But
forcing people in cars they don't otherwise wish to drive -- or indirectly
taxing them through the regulatory standards for not choosing to drive
cars that environmentalists like -- is not only wrong, it's
dangerous."
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