[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 76 (Thursday, May 10, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2611-S2613]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                       Fuel Efficiency Standards

  Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I was filling up my Chrysler Town & 
Country minivan with gas last weekend, and I noticed the price in 
Delaware is up to about $2.80 a gallon for regular gas. That is up by 
close to $1 above what it was not that long ago.
  I remember that the first time I bought gasoline in Delaware, I was 
right out of the Navy. I served in the Vietnam war as a naval flight 
officer, and I moved from California to Delaware. I drove my car to a 
gas station right in the middle of a gas war.
  I actually benefited from the gas war in 1969 in Texas. I was driving 
from Pensacola, FL, to the San Diego Naval Station. I filled up my 
Volkswagen Commandeer for less than $2 during the gas war in some 
little town in Texas.
  Fast forward to, I think, 1970 through 1974, and we are having a 
different kind of war. It is with OPEC. They are putting the squeeze on 
us and much of the rest of the world by reducing the amount of oil they 
are bringing out of the ground and driving up prices.
  Then we had an oil blockade, and things really got interesting for a 
while. I am not sure who was President then, whether it was Gerald 
Ford, who was succeeded by Jimmy Carter. But somebody--maybe it was 
Democrats and Republicans--finally said: You know, we have to be 
smarter than this. We continue to be dependent on foreign oil. They can 
put a blockade in place and essentially make it difficult for us to get 
oil and pay the prices that they want.
  So Democrats, Republicans, the President, and Congress, working 
together, decided we should increase the fuel efficiency of our cars in 
this country. We hadn't done that for quite a while. They put in place 
fuel efficiency standards for cars. We stepped up the mileage 
requirements for a period of years, and after several years, that 
target level stopped. We reached a ceiling; I think it was like 27 
miles per gallon, as I recall. But after that, the CAFE standards 
stayed right there for years, maybe for a couple of decades.
  We kind of revisited the issue, I want to say in 2007, and said: You 
know, that doesn't make much sense. Why don't we begin to increase fuel 
efficiency again? We did so with bipartisan legislation. Senator Dianne 
Feinstein, Ted Stevens, and I, along with others, worked on it and 
passed legislation to increase--not dramatically, but for a while, for 
a number of years--fuel efficiency standards for cars, light trucks, 
and SUVs.
  When we fell into the great recession in 2007, 2008, 2009, we saw the 
auto companies--a couple of them, Chrysler and I believe GM--going into 
bankruptcy. They got a huge bailout from our taxpayers, from the 
government. I was one of the people who sponsored and supported that. 
But in return for their getting that kind of help, they agreed to a

[[Page S2612]]

more rigorous increase in fuel efficiency standards going forward.
  There is going to be talk tomorrow in the White House about whether 
we should continue to raise fuel efficiency standards for cars and 
light trucks and SUVs.
  Interestingly enough, the CEOs from a number of American auto 
companies and those that have plants here but are actually maybe 
foreign-based, foreign-headquartered auto companies are going to meet 
with the President tomorrow, and they are going to be talking about 
what should be done with these fuel efficiency standards. Should we 
continue to ramp them up? Under current law, they are going to continue 
to be ramped up until about 2024, 2025, and then after that, there is 
really nothing in the law that says what should happen after 2025.
  There are some in the White House--maybe the President but maybe some 
others in the White House--who think that we ought to basically hold 
them in place where they are and not continue to increase fuel 
efficiency standards for cars and light trucks and SUVs. The 
administration has been basically suggesting a message or a path 
forward that says: Let's just sort of hold it in place--kind of like we 
did for 20 years on the heels of the Arab oil embargo.
  So the White House will be meeting tomorrow with these auto 
executives, and it will be an interesting conversation. I expect the 
President is going to say: Look, we are going to give you a break. We 
don't think you ought to be building cars, trucks, and vans that nobody 
wants to buy. People want to buy big vehicles, fuel-inefficient 
vehicles. It doesn't matter; they are basically going to stop 
increasing fuel efficiency standards. That should help the idea of the 
White House and the auto companies to say: That should be what you 
want. That should be what you need.
  The message that I think the President will hear from the auto 
industry is going to probably be a surprising one for him because that 
is not what they are going to be asking for.
  I don't know if our Presiding Officer makes customer calls. I do. I 
was doing it when I was Governor and as a Congressman and a treasurer 
before that. I visit businesses large and small, year in and year out.
  At one time, Delaware built more cars, trucks, and vans per capita 
than any other State in the United States. We had a plant in Newark, 
DE, near the University of Delaware, and 4,000 people worked there for 
Chrysler. We had another 4,000 who worked at the GM plant not far from 
here, between Wilmington and Newark. We lost them both during the great 
recession. We lost them both, 8,000 jobs, just like that. So I like to 
stay close to the auto industry. I think it is important to have a 
vibrant and strong auto industry in this country. I have done a lot of 
customer calls over the years to auto manufacturers, including Chrysler 
and GM, for reasons that are important for Delaware, but I have visited 
a bunch of other companies as well.
  When I do customer calls, I ask three questions of whomever I am 
visiting. I ask: How are you doing? How are we doing--``we'' being the 
State of Delaware, whether as the Governor of Delaware or from the 
Federal Government. How are we doing, and what can we do to help? How 
are you doing? How are we doing? What can we do to help?
  I hope that during this conversation that will take place about 25 
hours from now--I hope the President is in a listening mood. I hope he 
will say: Well, what do you need? Because here is what he is likely to 
hear from them: They are not asking for relief and to not have to 
comply with fuel efficiency standards. Here is what they are asking 
for: They are asking for some flexibility in the near years, between 
2021 and 2025, and in return for some flexibility in the targets for 
fuel efficiency during those years, they are willing to agree to more 
aggressive targets in the outyears, between 2025 and 2030.
  The auto industry knows that by then--I don't know if the majority of 
vehicles being built in this country will be electric-powered, battery-
powered, maybe powered with fuel cells, but we are going to see a 
revolution here in this country and, frankly, around the world. In the 
rest of the world, they are going to be building vehicles--cars, 
trucks, vans, SUVs--that are much more fuel efficient and, frankly, far 
less polluting. We in this country will get to compete in a world 
marketplace against those competitors. How do we better ensure that we 
are able to compete?
  So what the auto industry is going to say is, give us some 
flexibility in the near term--2021 to 2025--and we are willing to work 
with more rigorous standards thereafter. Give us some certainty.
  Currently, the folks in California and about 10 other States who 
support California have the ability to, under the law, have their own 
separate standards, fuel efficiency standards, compared to the rest of 
the country. When this was first envisioned, the auto companies almost 
had a heart attack. They said that the idea of having to build one set 
of models--say for a Ford--or having to build one version of that model 
for California and 10 or 11 other States and then something different 
for the other maybe 40 States--they didn't want to worry about that. 
They didn't want to have to do that. They know we need to be more 
energy efficient and less polluting. They were concerned about having 
to do that--two versions of every model. So it has been worked out that 
California can continue to have its own standards, but the auto 
industry--and, frankly, other countries, too, that build vehicles--will 
build one version of one model for each of the models that are sold in 
this country.
  Tomorrow, the auto companies are going to say: We need to be able to 
continue to do that. We don't need to be building two versions of the 
same automobile for every car and truck and SUV that is sold in this 
country.
  The automobile industry is going to say to the President that there 
is no need to kick California to the curb, or these other States that 
support that position; what we do need is what I said earlier--some 
flexibility in the fuel efficiency targets in the near term, up to 
2025, and after that, more rigorous standards going forward.
  One of the things I learned a long time before I was Governor was 
that among the things that businesses need are certainty and 
predictability. They need certainty. They need predictability. That is 
especially true in the auto industry, where the lead time building a 
new car or truck or SUV or van can be 5, 6, 7 years. That is why this 
is an important conversation to have tomorrow.
  I learned long before I was Governor that Governors don't create 
jobs, Presidents don't create jobs, Senators don't create jobs, and 
mayors don't create jobs. What we do is we help create a nurturing 
environment for job creation. Among the things that help provide that 
nurturing environment are predictability and certainty with respect to 
our laws, with respect to our regulations. It is also helpful to have 
the Federal Government and maybe colleges and universities provide some 
money for research and development. Some of the R&D that has enabled 
our auto fleet--our trucks, our light trucks and SUVs--to be more 
energy efficient--some of the R&D provided, appropriated here by this 
body, has been used to make us more competitive in world markets.
  Our tax policy is designed to encourage people to buy more energy-
efficient vehicles. We use the government's purchasing power to buy 
more energy-efficient vehicles so they will be making a market, so they 
will be more likely to be able to sell them and build them in quantity.
  I would just conclude by saying: Mr. President, when you meet with 
these folks tomorrow, carmakers from across the country and around the 
world, I hope that you won't just tell them what you think they want to 
hear but that you will ask them: What do you need? What do you need?
  I think the message he will hear will be quite different from the 
message he is prepared to give them.
  If we really want to help the domestic auto industry, we can do that. 
It is not by rolling back or freezing in place fuel efficiency 
standards; it is by helping us to get to the next level using the kind 
of technology in our vehicles that we can sell around the world and 
compete against the best in the rest of the world.
  I think that is it for me. I don't see anybody else on the floor 
asking to speak, so I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.

[[Page S2613]]

  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. PORTMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.