This is just utter nonsense and an outrage.

The very people forcing this on us drive in limos

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=agqPp0iSPbp4&refer=worldwide

By Kim Chipman and John Hughes

May 18 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama will announce tomorrow new rules for vehicle emissions and mileage, setting the first-ever nationwide standard for greenhouse-gas pollution, according to people familiar with the plan.

The limit will be coordinated with new national fuel economy standards for cars and trucks, said the people, who asked not to be identified before the announcement.

The action, which follows California’s push for approval of its own proposed standards, is the “biggest single step to curb global warming,” Dan Becker, director of the environmental group Safe Climate Campaign, said in an interview.

The White House’s top energy, environment and transportation officials have been meeting with automaker executives and other groups as the administration worked to craft a single national policy for vehicle emissions. It seeks to avoid the confusion of different state rules across the country.

The Washington-based Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, whose members include General Motors Corp., Chrysler LLC, Ford Motor Co. and Toyota Motor Corp., has called for a single standard.

It’s “yet another indication of the growing consensus within the business community that Congress needs to take strong action on energy reform, and it needs to do it now,” Dan Weiss, a director of climate policy at the Washington-based Center for American Progress, a Democratic-leaning policy group, said in a statement.

2012 Vehicles

The proposed federal rule would start with 2012 vehicle models and by 2016 models would equate to a fuel-economy standard of slightly less than 35.5 miles per gallon, said one of the persons knowledgeable about the plan.

The Transportation Department announced in March that cars and light trucks will be required to meet a U.S. fuel-economy average of 27.3 miles per gallon for 2011 models, a 2 mpg increase from the previous year’s level.

Obama, in his first week in office, directed his administration to reconsider the denial by former President George W. Bush’s administration of California’s request to set its own rules limiting tailpipe emissions. GM and other automakers have said the California standard would cost billions of dollars and harm their struggling industry.

California requested a waiver to impose its own standards in 2005 and has said that the Bush administration misinterpreted the Clean Air Act in making its decision. California’s program is aimed at cutting gases tied to global warming 30 percent by 2016.

To contact the reporter on this story: Kim Chipman in Washington at kchipman@bloomberg.net; John Hughes in Washington at jhughes5@bloomberg.net.