In keeping with their commitment to the Government, automobile manufacturers will display fuel efficiency/ mileage information in all new passenger vehicles rolling out from January 1, 2009.The voluntary move to make fuel consumption of each vehicle transparent will be adopted by all manufacturers by April 1, 2009. Disclosure of fuel efficiency has been a norm for vehicles in the US and European countries for years now.“We will start the process beginning January 1, 2009 and by April 1, 2009, each new passenger vehicle will come with this consumer information on fuel consumption in km/litre format at the point of sale. This initiative will start initially with passenger vehicles, but will extend to commercial vehicles as well at a later stage,” Pawan Goenka, vice-president, Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM), said.This disclosure of fuel efficiency of vehicles will, however, come with a huge disclaimer clearly stating that the disclosed figure has been arrived at in test conditions and fuel values could differ due to variables such as driving habits, road and traffic conditions, fuel quality, maintenance practices, loading pattern and so on.SIAM has also written to the Ministry of Shipping, Road Transport and Highways (MORTH), informing that they will voluntarily start displaying consumer information in km/litre in a sticker format which will also include vehicle manufacturer’s details, vehicle model and variant, engine displacement, fuel type used by the vehicle and the fuel economy.The disclosure of fuel efficiency information is also likely to be followed by a star-rating system for vehicles depending on their economy rate.At the latest round of meetings on fuel efficiency norms held this week, there was a near unanimous view on shifting to mileage-based norms rather than CO2-based ones as had also been opined by the PMO recently. It had also been agreed that the Bureau of Energy Efficiency’s comparative star-rating system for vehicles should be accepted as the methodology. The issue of who will enforce the mileage-based fuel efficiency norms and notify them is, however, still undecided as both BEE and MORTH have been claiming it as their prerogative.
