EPA estimates diesel fuel costs could increase by four to five cents per gallon. The benefits of the action outweigh costs by 16 to one. Last December, the Clinton Administration announced the cleanest tailpipe standards ever for passenger vehicles. Those standards for the first time ever ensured that SUVs, minivans and pick-up trucks would run as cleanly as other passenger vehicles. That action, as well as today's, will ensure that every single new vehicle on the American road in the future will be up to 95 percent cleaner than all vehicles now on the road.
Strategies are underway to reduce the regional haze which shrouds vistas in many national parks.
And toxic air pollution, some of which can cause cancer, is being reduced by 1.5 million tons per year. The new program will treat both cleaner engines and cleaner diesel fuel as a single system to ensure dramatic health benefits for all Americans, including avoiding 8,300 premature deaths yearly. The standards will begin to take effect in 2006-2007. The standards will begin to take effect in 2004. For the first time ever, SUVs and pick-up trucks will be as clean as passenger cars.