Tuesday, August 2, 2005

EPA retains fuel test standard

U.S. Rep. Rogers blocks effort to update gas-economy ratings from the '80s.

By Jeff Plungis / Detroit News Washington Bureau

Fuel economy labels -- a timeline 1970s: EPA develops indoor lab test to measure whether automakers comply with Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards. 1985: Following consumer complaints that window stickers are inaccurate, EPA adjusts lab test values to reflect real-world driving. June 2002: Bluewater Network, a San Francisco consumer group, petitions for more accurate labels March 2004: EPA grants petition, begins researching newer, more accurate mileage tests July 2005: Congress passes an energy bill that halts work on new tests. EPA is authorized to revise its fudge factor to reflect higher speeds, use of air conditioning and greater congestion. Comment on this story Send this story to a friend Get Home Delivery

WASHINGTON -- With the energy bill that cleared Congress last week, the Environmental Protection Agency will not be devising a new, more accurate test to estimate fuel-economy ratings found on new car and light truck window stickers.

U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Brighton, acting on the concerns of Detroit automakers, successfully blocked an attempt to authorize new EPA testing procedures.

Instead of devising a new way to measure vehicles' fuel economy for the window sticker -- reflecting the different ways Americans drive today -- the EPA will do a new calculation.

Rogers' amendment, adopted by the House-Senate conference committee finalizing four years of work on national energy policy, ensures the EPA will continue to use the same test it has used since the 1970s. Known as the "federal test procedure," it is run inside a lab, on a dynamometer, at a maximum speed of 55 mph, with the air conditioner off.

But Congress directed the EPA to study modern driving patterns to come up with "adjustment factors."

The EPA has been looking to update fuel economy ratings for the first time since the 1980s to better reflect higher highway speed limits, growing city congestion and the wider use of air conditioning -- all factors that can dramatically reduce fuel economy in the real world.

In May, EPA officials told a gathering of the Society of Automotive Engineers in Washington that they were in the planning phases of a new laboratory test. In some of the tests under consideration, vehicles would run at speeds of up to 70 mph, at higher temperatures to reflect the country's population shift to the South, and with the air conditioner running.

Rogers said he was worried that a new test would have added unnecessary costs at a time when Detroit automakers are struggling to remain competitive. Forcing automakers to perform another regiment of compliance testing would take money away from other needs, like research and development into new fuel-saving technologies, he said.

"The timing was especially bad," Rogers said. "This would have had a devastating impact on the U.S. auto industry."

Consumer groups complain that today's window stickers inflate fuel economy expectations, overestimating mileage by up to 35 percent.

But automakers like the current test, since it is easy to reproduce. They argue that consumers already know that their actual mileage may vary, and the objective test does a good job at allowing them to compare different models.

In 2002, the Bluewater Network, an environmental group based in San Francisco, petitioned the EPA for a new test, saying the estimated mileage values "are not reflective of the fuel economy that American drivers are actually achieving on the road."

Consumers end up paying up to $500 a year more on gasoline than they expected when they made their purchases, said Russell Long, executive director of the Bluewater Network. Given that there are hundreds of millions of cars on the road, Americans are spending tens of billions of dollars a year on unintended fuel costs, Long said.

"The federal test procedure is laughably inaccurate, and frankly it doesn't make any sense to measure a car's fuel mileage by connecting a hose to the exhaust pipe of a car on a treadmill," Long said. "We think consumers may end up with another set of inaccurate labels due to Congress' interference."

The government has attempted to deal with the matter before. In 1985, following years of consumer complaints about the original lab test falling short of estimating real-world mileage, the EPA began discounting the lab results by 10 percent for the highway estimate and 22 percent for the city estimate.

EPA spokesman John Millet said the agency had not yet had a chance to analyze the impact of the Rogers amendment.

"It's too soon to say anything about the energy bill," Millet said. "We're still going through it."

EPA officials did not return calls seeking comment.

General Motors Corp. spokesman Chris Preuss said by working off the existing laboratory test, the EPA would be able to give more accurate mileage estimates without the expense of new regulatory requirements.