Federal Judge Rules Against Automakers
The Detroit News reports that U.S. District Judge William K. Sessions III rejected automakers' attempt to keep Vermont and 10 other states from adopting California's stricter emission standards. Vermont's brief argued that the Mountain State needs the new standards to protect their maple syrup and skiing industries from the environmental impact of auto-related greenhouse gases. (No mention was made of the environmental impact of these two industries.) The automakers countered that meeting the standards would too costly, if not impossible. Sessions' ruling stated "The court remains unconvinced automakers cannot meet the challenge of Vermont and California's [greenhouse gas] regulations" because they "fail to demonstrate that the regulation is not feasible, given the flawed assumptions and overly conservative selection of technologies documented." Sierra Club lawyer David Bookbinder hailed the decision as a triumph over "another example of Detroit crying wolf." Incidentally, the court's decision was 240 pages long. One wonders how many trees were cut down to publish this ruling.
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@essen 09-13 13:20 -- Or maybe just sell the vehicles that meet the requirements of the lawsuit, verbatim, right now. Then, after auto dealers start failing because Vermonters go out-of-state to pick up the vehicles they want; the auto industry can demonstrate that their residents are showing the legislature how dumb a collection of pantywaists they really are.y that can be punished by removing consumer choice.
Um, but it is a big deal to people in Cali. They buy less new cars. I will admit that I have no stats on this, but I did live there and from a completely anecdotal standpoint the driving junker percentage was higher than any other place I have ever lived. Only Colorado, which taxes the beans out of new cars, and El Paso which has no rust and a lot of poor people, came even close to the SF Bay area for crummy old autos on the road. At any rate, I can't see this as a big deal. They already make the cars for Cali, so just make more, or sell less. What's the big deal?
One more thing. If Mercedes has a 40 mpg S class available, and that's what Vermonters want to drive, then let them. Hope they have lots of cash though.