California Air Resources Board mandates for increased production of emission-less vehicles – Part 1

The world is no doubt facing the worst global warming conditions in the history of this the planet and one major factor involved in this aggravation is the pollution. However, worst opprobrium in this regard is always directed at automotive industry.

California-based California Air Resources Board (CARB) has mandated a new regulation for the automakers to impose increased production of electric, hybrids, plug-in hybrids and hydrogen-fuelled vehicles henceforth. CARB rolled out a new target to the car-makers in the US. According to this rule, by 2025 all the car manufacturers in the US will increase to the production of the vehicles that omit zero or near zero carbon particles, including carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide, to 15 percent.

Although the government sector played a vital part dictating the mandate, automakers have also been pushed to bow to the new regulation. This act might be in the welfare of the environment but it will have its ramifications on the auto industry. The trend of purchasing electric cars and sort is still in its tender stage. By 2025, there might be environment friendly vehicles available in the market, most probably with cheap price tags, thanks to CARB, but there is no assurance that there will be any buyers.

Tiffany Groode, Director of Automotive Scenarios Advisory Service for IHS CERA stated in a research note: “Will the stringency of this proposed standard require them to build vehicles that consumers may or may not want or be able to afford? Historically, fuel economy has not been a top consideration for U.S. consumers in choosing to buy one car over another.”

In the last five years, since trend of owning hybrids has allegedly beefed up, the sales of such vehicles has topped a mere 2.8% of total sales. Aggravating more is the statistic of last year, in which the sales could hit a diminutive figure of 2.1 percent. For the last two years, the electric car sales have been declining, clearly showing that the trend of battery-powered cars is diminishing.

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Posted by Usman Khalid on Feb 1 2012. Filed under Business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.