Proposed Rule2025-22674
Public Hearing for Corporate Average Fuel Economy Standards: The Safer Affordable Fuel-Efficient (SAFE) Vehicle Rule III for Model Years 2022 to 2031 Passenger Cars and Light Trucks
Primary source
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Published
December 12, 2025
Issuing agencies
Transportation DepartmentNational Highway Traffic Safety Administration
Abstract
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is announcing a virtual public hearing to be held January 7, 2026 on its proposal for the "The Safer Affordable Fuel-Efficient (SAFE) Vehicle Rule III for Model Years 2022 to 2031 Passenger Cars and Light Trucks," which was signed on December 2, 2025. This hearing also allows the public to provide oral comments regarding the Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (Draft SEIS) that accompanies the proposal. An additional virtual session will be held on January 8, 2026, if necessary, to accommodate the number of people that sign up to speak.
Full Text
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<title>Federal Register, Volume 90 Issue 237 (Friday, December 12, 2025)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 90, Number 237 (Friday, December 12, 2025)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Pages 57726-57727]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2025-22674]
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DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
49 CFR Parts 531, 533, 535, and 537
[NHTSA-2025-0491]
RIN 2127-AM76
Public Hearing for Corporate Average Fuel Economy Standards: The
Safer Affordable Fuel-Efficient (SAFE) Vehicle Rule III for Model Years
2022 to 2031 Passenger Cars and Light Trucks
AGENCY: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA),
Department of Transportation (DOT).
ACTION: Notification of public hearing.
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SUMMARY: The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is
announcing a virtual public hearing to be held January 7, 2026 on its
proposal for the ``The Safer Affordable Fuel-Efficient (SAFE) Vehicle
Rule III for Model Years 2022 to 2031 Passenger Cars and Light
Trucks,'' which was signed on December 2, 2025. This hearing also
allows the public to provide oral comments regarding the Draft
Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (Draft SEIS) that
accompanies the proposal. An additional virtual session will be held on
January 8, 2026, if necessary, to accommodate the number of people that
sign up to speak.
DATES: NHTSA will hold a virtual public hearing on January 7, 2026. An
additional session will be held on January 8, 2026, if necessary, to
accommodate the number of people that sign up to testify. Please refer
to the SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section for additional information on
the public hearing.
ADDRESSES: The virtual public hearing will be held on January 7, 2026.
An additional session will be held on January 8, 2026, if necessary, to
accommodate the number of speakers that sign up to testify. Each day
the hearing will convene at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time and will conclude
when the last pre-registered speaker has testified but no later than
6:00 p.m. Eastern Time. All hearing attendees, including those who do
not intend to provide oral testimony, should register by December 31,
2025. The link to register will be available at <a href="http://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe">http://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe</a>. Additional information regarding the hearing appears below under
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: For questions regarding how to
register to attend the hearing, please contact NHTSA's Office of
Communications at <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#8dc3c5d9decca3cee2e0e0f8e3e4eeecf9e4e2e3cde9e2f9a3eae2fb"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="eaa4a2beb9abc4a98587879f8483898b9e838584aa8e859ec48d859c">[email protected]</span></a>. For any other questions
about this notice, please contact Joseph Bayer, Corporate Average Fuel
Economy (CAFE) Program Division Chief, Office of Rulemaking, NHTSA, at
<a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#25666463607a48474a5d65414a510b424a53"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="084b494e4d57656a6770486c677c266f677e">[email protected]</span></a>.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: NHTSA, on behalf of the Department of
Transportation, is proposing to amend CAFE standards for light-duty
vehicles for model years (MYs) 2022-2026 and MYs 2027-2031. Consistent
with the requirements of the CAFE program, the fuel economy standards
proposed in this rule are founded on light-duty vehicles powered by
gasoline and diesel fuels, a category that these rules treat as
including non-plug-in hybrid vehicles. In formulating the proposed
standards, NHTSA has not considered the imputed fuel-economy
performance of battery-powered electric vehicles or the electric
operation of vehicles that use plug-in hybrid electric powertrains and
has not considered compliance credits nor adjustments to the
statutorily required two-cycle fuel economy test procedures to account
for air conditioning and off-cycle technologies, since such
consideration is prohibited by statute. NHTSA is proposing to set fuel
economy standards that increase from the newly proposed MY 2022
standards at 0.5 percent per year through MY 2026 followed by 0.25
percent per year through MY 2031, with MY 2027 stringency as a bridge
between the two sets of standards. The reduced stringency in later
years, coupled with a reevaluation of the coefficients that define the
fuel economy standards functions, are intended to enable the industry
to adapt to proposals to remove credit trading and to classify
passenger and non-passenger automobiles appropriately, based on their
attributes and capabilities, starting in MY 2028. NHTSA projects that
the amended standards would correspond to industry fleetwide average
all light-duty vehicles of roughly 34.5 miles per gallon (mpg) in MY
2031. The proposal was signed on December 2, 2025, and was published in
the Federal Register on December 5, 2025 (90 FR 56438). A notice of
availability for the accompanying Draft SEIS was published in the
Federal Register on December 5, 2025 (90 FR 56144). The Draft SEIS is
available on NHTSA's CAFE website, <a href="https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe">https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe</a>, and is
also available in Docket ID No. NHTSA-2025-0490.
Participation in Virtual Public Hearing
NHTSA will begin pre-registering speakers for the hearing upon
publication of this document in the Federal Register. To register to
speak at the virtual hearing, please follow the instructions below. The
last day to register to speak at the hearing will be December 31, 2025.
[[Page 57727]]
<bullet> To watch the hearing (without providing oral comments):
Click the link at <a href="https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe">https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe</a> and register. Indicate NO
on the registration page that you do not wish to provide testimony.
Within 24 hours of registering, you will be emailed your link to join.
<bullet> To provide oral comment at the hearing: Click the link at
<a href="https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe">https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe</a> and register by December 31, 2025. Indicate
YES on the registration page that you would like to provide comments.
Within 1 hour of registering, you will be emailed your link to join.
Additionally, you will receive an email with your approximate date and
time to testify as well as additional information about how to turn on
your audio and camera to comment. We recommend you join via a computer,
but if you are unable to do so, an option to join via phone will also
be provided in that email.
If you do not receive your confirmation email(s), or have further
questions about this hearing, please email <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#f1bfb9a5a2b0dfb29e9c9c849f98929085989e9fb1959e85df969e87"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="b9f7f1edeaf897fad6d4d4ccd7d0dad8cdd0d6d7f9ddd6cd97ded6cf">[email protected]</span></a>.
NHTSA is committed to providing equal access to this event for all
participants. Closed captioning will be available. People with
disabilities who need additional accommodations should send a request
to <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#d19f99858290ff92bebcbca4bfb8b2b0a5b8bebf91b5bea5ffb6bea7"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="622c2a3631234c210d0f0f170c0b0103160b0d0c22060d164c050d14">[email protected]</span></a> no later than December 31, 2025.
Each commenter will have 3 minutes to provide oral testimony. NHTSA
may ask clarifying questions during the oral presentations but will not
otherwise respond to the presentations at that time. NHTSA recommends
submitting the text of your oral comments as written comments to the
rulemaking docket or to the Draft SEIS docket, as appropriate. Written
statements and supporting information submitted during the comment
period will be considered with the same weight as oral comments and
supporting information presented at the public hearing. If identical
comments are submitted by the same commenter more than once to the
docket, NHTSA does not consider those comments to carry more weight
than if they had been submitted only once. If the oral testimony is
specifically intended to reference the Draft SEIS, please mention that
in your opening remarks.
Please note that any updates made to any aspects of the hearing
logistics, including any change to the date of the hearing or a
potential additional session on January 8, 2026, will be posted online
at the CAFE website at <a href="https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe">https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe</a>. While NHTSA expects
the hearing to go forward as set forth above, please monitor our
website or contact the person listed in the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION
CONTACT section to determine if there are any updates. NHTSA does not
intend to publish a document in the Federal Register announcing
updates. Finally, NHTSA will post a video recording of the hearing at
<a href="https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe">https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe</a> and will make a transcript of the hearing
available in the rule making docket as soon as practicable.
How can I get copies of the proposed action, the Draft SEIS, and other
related information?
NHTSA has established a docket for the proposal under Docket ID No.
NHTSA-2025-0491 and a separate docket for the Draft SEIS at Docket ID
No. NHTSA-2025-0490. Relevant documents and information can also be
accessed at NHTSA's CAFE website at <a href="https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe">https://www.nhtsa.gov/cafe</a>. Please
refer to the notice of proposed rulemaking for detailed information on
accessing information related to the proposal and the Draft SEIS.
Issued on December 10, 2025, in Washington, DC, under authority
delegated in 49 CFR 1.95.
Jonathan Morrison,
Administrator.
[FR Doc. 2025-22674 Filed 12-11-25; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4910-59-P
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