What is CAFE?
CAFE stands for Corporate Average Fuel Economy and refers to federal automobile fuel efficiency standards. Improving automobile fuel efficiency would greatly decrease the United State’s oil dependency because over 40% of the oil used in the country goes toward fueling our cars and trucks. Enhanced fuel efficiency would not only reduce our oil dependency, but it would also significantly reduce CO2 emissions. The standards set in 1975, requiring new cars to average 27.5 miles per gallon and light trucks to average 20.7 miles per gallon (mpg), was achieved in the 1980s, despite carmakers complaints that the requirements would impede product design. Today, a coalition of consumer, safety, and environmental advocates are calling for further improvement in CAFE standards. These new standards would be 45 mpg for cars and 34 mpg for light trucks over the next 10 years. Legislation has also been introduced to subject SUVs to the same CAFE standards as passenger cars. This is Senate Bill 804 int
