New Fuel Economy Standards Could Mean Billions for New Hampshire

By Mark Bevis on Monday, June 8, 2009.

Researchers at the University of New Hampshire have been crunching some numbers.

And they've found New England stands to gain billions of dollars when fuel economy standards are tightened.

Last month, President Barack Obama announced he would work to improve fuel economy standards from an average of 25 to over 35 miles perr gallon by the year 2016.

That's a 40 percent increase.

And as Cameron Wake tells NHPR's Mark Bevis, that savings will likely go directly back into our economy.

Wake is a Research Associate Professor at the Institute for the Study of Earch, Oceans and Space at UNH.

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Increased fuel economy doesn't save gas
John Ranta - Tue, 06/09/2009 - 20:56

The counter-intuitive result of increasing the fuel economy of vehicles is that this has never led to reduced gas consumption. If we increase the fuel economy of vehicles without increasing the price of fuel, we actually make the cost of driving cheaper. What we have seen from past increases in vehicle fuel economy has been that people drive more, or buy bigger vehicles. The only sure way to cut gas consumption is to raise gas prices. If we focus on making gasoline more expensive (by raising gas taxes), we won't have to worry about forcing automakers to improve the fuel efficiency of vehicles, the market will do that for us. JR