The Toronto Star reported an alarming factoid earlier this month:

No gasoline-powered car assembled in North America would meet China’s current fuel-efficiency standard.

Grist relies on the support of generous readers like you to cover the stories that matter most. Thank you for donating.
Secure · Tax deductible · Takes 45 Seconds

Did this article feel meaningful?

Make others like it possible: Give now in under 45 seconds.
Secure · Tax deductible · Takes 45 Seconds

That’s mainly because:

  1. Currently, their standard is much higher than ours.
  2. Their standard is a minimum-allowable efficiency standard rather than a “fleet-average” standard like ours.
  3. Our lame car companies don’t make their (relatively few) most efficient vehicles in this country.

As for our much-hyped new 35-mpg (average) standard — in 2020, it will take us to where the Chinese are now (but not even to where Japan and Europe were six years ago). If we don’t rescind it, that is.

Grist thanks its sponsors. Become one.

To support our nonprofit environmental journalism, please consider disabling your ad-blocker to allow ads on Grist. Here's How

So whether you believe in human-caused global warming or peak oil, America remains unprepared to capture the huge explosion in jobs this century for clean, fuel-efficient cars.

Oh, and by 2010, China will be the world leader in wind turbine manufacturing and solar photovoltaics manufacturing. No worries, though: our TV and movie sales overseas still kick butt. For now.