Gasoline could soon cause less pollution in Wisconsin, as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed new standards for cars and fuel Friday to clean the air, reduce premature illness onset and boost automobile efficiency while increasing prices at gas pumps.

The EPA initiative would reduce gasoline’s sulfur content three-fold and smog-forming compounds and nitrogen oxides by 80 percent, according to an EPA statement.

“[Friday’s] proposed standards – which will save thousands of lives and protect the most vulnerable – are the next step in our work to protect public health and will provide the automotive industry with the certainty they need to offer the same car models in all 50 states,” EPA Acting Administrator Bob Perciasepe said in the statement.

EPA spokesperson Enesta Jones said the proposal could be approved as soon as 2014 and then implemented in 2017. If ratified, every commercial vendor of gasoline would have to abide by the EPA’s new standards for fuel by that time, she said.

Jones added this measure to clean fuel would raise gas prices approximately eight cents per gallon. She said the EPA has not conducted focus groups yet to determine the public’s response to the initiative and its resulting hiked fuel costs.

“Anytime we make a decision based on sound science, it’s always our intention to set standards that will make our environment cleaner,” she said, calling the proposal the next step toward cleaner fuel.

University of Wisconsin mechanical engineering professor Rolf Reitz said he thinks people are generally happy to see fuels are getting cleaner, while realizing that cannot be achieved for free. He added engines are currently already 98 percent cleaner than they were in the 1970s.

Reitz, an expert on diesel and gas engine performance and emissions, said he believes these changes in gasoline standards are a result from California’s clean fuel mandates from January 2012, which he said the EPA is trying to harmonize with the rest of the country.

The agency’s effort to improve air quality through reducing polluting automobile emissions will be particularly significant for Wisconsin, according to Reitz. 

He said the Milwaukee region is a “non-attainment” area. This means the air quality there is routinely below EPA regulated levels, Reitz said. The region had the nation’s largest mass of air pollution in 2010 and did not meet ozone standards until April of last year, according to EPA reports. 

Aside from shelling out more money at gas stations, Reitz said the clean fuel proposal will not affect drivers but will instead improve emissions on cars allowing for better performance and greater longevity. 

“This is something the industry has come to realize: As long as we have been fuel people, we have been concerned about emissions and we’ll be ever tightening these emissions,” Reitz said.

This proposal makes engines more environmentally friendly, but
is not a substitute for gas-powered automobiles, he said. People
have sought an alternative energy source to replace gasoline for a hundred
years, so a breakthrough will not occur in the very near future, he added.

Jones said the new gasoline standards are a promising plan, however, they are indeed only in the draft stage as of now.

“It is a proposal, so it’s not final,” she said. “It needs to go through the normal rule-making process of getting sound input, but it’s definitely a step in the right direction in addressing public health issues.”