The complete testimony is available here as an Adobe Acrobat PDF.
ABSTRACT
In terms of future air pollution levels, Pennsylvania’s policy debate over whether to rely on federal Tier 2 or California LEV II automobile emissions standards is much ado about very little. Both standards will eliminate the vast majority of remaining automobile air pollution. But the stakes are high in terms of costs. The LEV II standards will be far more costly, mainly due to LEV II’s stringent fuel economy mandate. Pennsylvania can meet its clean air goals at the least cost by avoiding LEV II and instead relying on federal Tier 2 standards. To the extent Pennsylvania needs additional automobile pollution reductions, these would be best achieved not by trying to make extremely clean new cars just a tiny bit cleaner, but by implementing a program to identify and repair or scrap the few percent of cars on the road that account for most automobile emissions.
Joel Schwartz is a visiting fellow at AEI.
