Fredericton — Roger Melanson, minister of New Brunswick’s Department of Transportation and Infrastructure, today announced aggressive new fuel-efficiency standards for passenger vehicles sold and used in the province.
The United States’ Environmental Protection Agency standards, widely considered to be the benchmark for North American fuel-efficiency, call for an average fuel-efficiency for passenger vehicles of 35.5 mpg in 2016, rising to 41.7 mpg in 2020 and 54.5 mpg by 2025. Melanson, however, called the Americans “wusses” for setting such unambitious targets and announced New Brunswick’s own fuel-efficiency goals.
The initiative calls for all vehicles sold and operated within the province to have a minimum fuel-efficiency of 100 mpg (US) or 2.35 l/100km by 2018. Any vehicle that does not meet this minimum efficiency will be illegal to operate after Dec 31, 2017.
The Manatee researched which modes of transportation will meet the new requirements, and presents the following list of permitted methods:
- All-electric vehicles such as the Nissan Leaf, Toyota Prius Plug-In and the Tesla, provided that the electricity source is 100-percent renewable, such as by wind or solar power;
- Bicycles, tricycles, unicycles, bicycles built for 2 and various other forms of pedal-powered vehicles;
- Walking, jogging or running;
- Skis and snowshoes (during the winter months);
- Skateboards or rollerblades (for the remaining 4 months of the year);
- Horses and horse-drawn carriages, provided that the animals are fed a carbon-neutral diet and that their droppings are collected and used for fertilizer;
- Canoes, kayaks and other human-propelled watercraft;
- Rickshaws;
- Toboggans;
- Bobsleds;
- Drunk-walking (faster and more fun than regular walking);
- Hang-gliders, hot-air balloons and other non-motorized air vehicles;
- Magic carpet rides;
- Pushing one’s vehicle;
- Piggy-back rides; and
- Imagining one’s self at one’s destination.
“We recognize the hardships that this will place on New Brunswickers,” explained Melanson. “However, we believe that to fight climate change we must all make sacrifices. We hope that the rest of the world will follow our example.”