Corporate Average Fuel Economy Progress, 1978-2014

The Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) is the sales-weighted harmonic mean fuel economy of a manufacturer’s fleet of new cars or light trucks in a certain model year (MY). First enacted by Congress in 1975, the standards for cars began in MY 1978 and for light trucks in MY 1979. In general, the average of all cars has met or exceeded the standards each year; light trucks’ averages have mostly exceeded the standards as well. However, standards must be met on a manufacturer level – some manufacturers fall short of the standards while others exceed them. Legislation passed in December 2007 raised the CAFE standards beginning in MY 2011 – for cars, this was the first increase since 1990.