Obama administration to purchase the first 100 Chevy Volts

April 1, 2010June 8, 2011 Omar Rana Chevrolet Volt, Compact Cars, electric-cars, electric-vehicles, plug-in hybrids

Update: Obama administration to buy first 100 Chevy Volts – Free Press

Showing his commitment to fuel efficiency, President Obama announced today a government purchase of over 5,600 hybrid vehicles for the federal fleet. This move more than doubles the amount of hybrids in use by the government. The government, Obama said, “is doubling the number of hybrid vehicles in the federal fleet, even as we seek to reduce the number of cars and trucks used by our government overall. We’re going to lead by example and practice what we preach: cutting waste, saving energy and reducing our reliance on foreign oil.”

The Government Services Administration will use existing funds to replace 5,603 of the least fuel-efficient vehicles in the fleet with hybrids, and has committed to purchasing approximately 100 plug-in hybrids in 2011. The Energy Department also is replacing 753 vehicles with hybrid ones, bringing their total to 888. The plan across all government agencies is to not only increase fuel-efficiency, but also to decrease total fleet size.

The NHTSA and EPA will finalize on Thursday their joint rule establishing greenhouse gas emission standards and corporate average fuel economy standards for light-duty vehicles for model years 2012-2016. The measure will cost the industry $60 billion over five years while boosting fleet-wide efficiency to an overall 34.1 mpg by 2016. 23 percent of U.S. greenhouse gases are from vehicles. The plan set to be finalized Thursday will conserve 1.8 billion barrels of oil over the lifetime of vehicles sold in the next five years, while adding an average of $1,300 to the purchase price of a new car. The news isn”t all bad however, as buyers of those vehicles can expect about $3,000 in fuel-savings over the life of the vehicle.