Reframing Automobile Fuel Economy Policy in North America: The Politics of Punctuating a Policy Equilibrium

Anthony Perl and James A. Dunn

Transport Reviews, 2006, vol. 27, issue 1, 1-35

Abstract: The USA and Canada generate over one‐third of the transportation‐related emissions of carbon dioxide in the world. Motor vehicles produce a majority of these emissions. This paper examines how the US Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) regulatory standard for light‐duty vehicles has established an underlying fuel economy policy paradigm for the highly integrated North American automotive sector. While these standards pushed North American vehicle fuel efficiency higher in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the standards have not been significantly increased since 1985. The paper details the institutional, economic and political factors that have blocked higher CAFE standards. It describes difficulties with the legal efforts to shift the main venue of fuel economy regulation from the US federal government to the state of California. In light of the Canadian tradition of establishing voluntary agreements between the government and the auto manufacturers in lieu of formal regulation, it assesses the possibility that the voluntary agreement on reducing automotive greenhouse gas emissions signed between Ottawa and Canadian auto manufacturers in April 2005 will be a step toward a new style of negotiated advances in fuel economy and greenhouse gas reduction goals throughout North America.

Date: 2006
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/01441640600821308 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:transr:v:27:y:2006:i:1:p:1-35

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/TTRV20

DOI: 10.1080/01441640600821308

Access Statistics for this article

Transport Reviews is currently edited by Professor David Banister and Moshe Givoni

More articles in Transport Reviews from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().