Federal regulators in several countries are rethinking how they police car pollution, and one of the sharpest tools emerging is public disclosure of which brands are hitting or missing carbon dioxide targets. While the United States is moving in the opposite direction by weakening fuel economy and greenhouse gas rules, other governments are preparing to publish detailed performance data that will make it obvious which automakers are lagging. The clash between naming and shaming on one side and deregulation on the other will shape how quickly the global car fleet cuts CO₂.
The clearest example of this new transparency push is the way the Australian government plans to handle its New Vehicle Efficiency Standard, or NVES, which will track each brand’s emissions performance and expose those that fall short. At the same time, the Environmental Protection Agency in the United States is working to roll back its own greenhouse gas authority, and President Donald Trump is resetting Corporate Average Fuel Economy requirements, easing pressure on automakers to clean up their fleets. The result is a widening policy gap that leaves car buyers, manufacturers, and the climate facing very different incentives depending on which side of the Pacific they are on.
Australia’s NVES regulator prepares to publish brand‑by‑brand CO₂ performance
Australia is about to test how powerful public disclosure can be in pushing carmakers toward cleaner fleets. The NVES Regulator, which is the official authority enforcing NVES, is preparing to reveal its first interim emissions values, or IEVs, for the 2025 model year in February 2026. Those IEVs will show how each brand’s new vehicles performed against their assigned CO₂ targets, and brands that miss those targets face financial penalties under the NVES framework.
The government has already signaled that it will not keep those results quiet. Officials plan to publish 2025 NVES performance data, including which brands exceeded or fell short of their goals, once the IEVs are calculated. That means the NVES Regulator will not only enforce penalties where required, it will also effectively create a public scoreboard of emissions performance that consumers, investors, and advocacy groups can scrutinize. By tying financial consequences to transparent data, the system is designed to make it harder for high‑emitting line‑ups to hide behind fleet averages or marketing claims.
“Name and shame” becomes a deliberate policy tool for CO₂ laggards
Australian officials are going further than quiet compliance reports, and are explicitly preparing to call out brands that fail to clean up their fleets. The federal government has said that car makers that have failed to meet their target during the IEV period will be named and shamed, even though formal NVES penalties will not be issued until a later grace period ends in 2028. In practice, that means a list of car brands facing fines for failing to meet their NVES obligations will be made public well before the first invoices are sent.
This approach turns transparency into a form of soft regulation that can bite long before any cheque is written. Automakers that rely heavily on high‑emitting utes and SUVs will have to weigh the reputational cost of appearing on a government list of CO₂ laggards, especially as more buyers look for lower‑emission options. The policy also gives early credit to brands that over‑comply, since their strong IEV results will be visible in the same data release. Rather than treating emissions performance as a private compliance matter, the Australian government is using disclosure to shift market expectations in real time.
U.S. regulators move to dismantle greenhouse gas and fuel economy backstops
While Australia is building a tougher, more transparent regime, the United States is stripping away some of the core legal and financial levers that once pushed automakers toward lower emissions. The EPA has announced that it Proposes Repeal of Greenhouse Gas Endangerment Finding and Vehicle Emissions Rules, moving to undo the formal determination that greenhouse gases from vehicles endanger public health and welfare. In a separate legal analysis, the agency Proposes to Rescind Landmark Greenhouse Gas Endangerment Finding and Eliminate Mobile Source Emissions Standards for GHGs, which would remove the foundation for federal limits on tailpipe carbon pollution from cars and trucks.
At the same time, Congress has stepped in to weaken the financial consequences of inefficient fleets. Lawmakers have eliminated Corporate Average Fuel Economy penalties for passenger cars and light trucks, even though NHTSA finalized its most recent standard‑setting rulemaking in 2024 covering those vehicles. Under the previous regime, an automaker that missed its CAFE target could owe millions of dollars in fines, but those penalties are now being erased. Reporting on what the EPA ruling means for automakers notes that The Fines That Are Going Away Then include exactly these fuel economy penalties, which means a company that once faced a $17 million bill for non‑compliance will no longer see that cost.
Trump’s reset of CAFE standards tilts the market back toward gasoline
The White House has reinforced this deregulatory turn by rewriting the trajectory of fuel economy rules. President Donald Trump has announced the reset of Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards, arguing that Trump is delivering major relief to American families by undoing what he calls the Biden Administration’s costly and unlawful Corpo rules. The administration has already rolled back fuel economy standards so that CAFE requirements, which once demanded steady efficiency gains across an automaker’s fleet, now increase more slowly, with some reporting noting that the Trump administration has already defanged the existing CAFE standards by eliminating the fines associated with them.
The practical effect is to make it easier and cheaper for automakers to keep selling conventional gasoline and diesel vehicles instead of accelerating the shift to cleaner models. One analysis of the policy reversal notes that In the United States the policy reversal signals a retreat rather than progress, and Instead of pushing for safer air and lower emissions, the weaker standards encourage manufacturers to keep investing in traditional internal combustion vehicles while devoting fewer resources to cleaner options. With CAFE penalties gone and greenhouse gas rules under attack, there is no equivalent federal plan to publicly identify brands that fall short on CO₂, and the main pressure on U.S. automakers now comes from state policies and consumer demand rather than national regulators.
Automakers juggle EV investments, profits, and diverging climate rules
Automakers are caught between these contrasting regulatory philosophies as they plan product line‑ups for the next decade. In markets that are tightening standards and publishing detailed emissions data, companies that lean too heavily on thirsty models risk both fines and public criticism. In Australia, for example, brands that miss NVES targets will not only face financial penalties after the grace period, they will also be singled out in official performance data that shows exactly how far they fell short. That creates a direct incentive to bring in more efficient hybrids and battery electric vehicles to balance out popular but high‑emitting models.
In the United States, the calculus looks different. Reporting on American Automakers Are Facing an Expensive EV Dilemma amid shifting rules describes how CEO Antonio Filosa framed the situation, saying, “And this will mean to us a lot of additional profit,” when discussing a strategy that keeps certain profitable guzzlers in the line‑up while not walking away from EVs. With CAFE penalties removed and greenhouse gas standards under threat, companies can continue to sell high‑margin trucks and SUVs without the same regulatory costs, even as they maintain a parallel push into electric models to satisfy pockets of demand and comply with other jurisdictions. Research on the Progress and Potential for Electric Vehicles to Reduce Carbon Emissions underscores why these choices matter, noting that Carbon emissions from the power sector currently and through 2025 will vary a great deal by geographic areas of the country, which means the climate benefit of each additional EV depends on where it is plugged in and how quickly grids decarbonize.
Climate stakes rise as federal policy drifts away from science
The Environmental Protection Agency’s effort to abandon its own climate findings has implications far beyond the legal text. The Environmental Protection Agency is moving to discard rules that treated greenhouse gases from vehicles as significant contributors to climate change, even though transportation remains a major source of U.S. emissions. Critics argue that removing the endangerment finding and related standards would be one of the most far‑reaching deregulatory moves in U.S. history, because it would undercut the scientific and legal basis for treating CO₂ from cars and trucks as a pollutant that must be controlled.
That shift stands in stark contrast to jurisdictions that are tightening oversight and preparing to publicly highlight which brands are not doing their share. In Australia, the NVES Regulator is building a system where poor performance will be visible in February 2026 when 2025 NVES performance data are unveiled, and where brands that fail may face financial penalties after the grace period in 2028. In the United States, by contrast, federal regulators are not planning to name and shame carmakers that miss CO₂ goals, and are instead dismantling the very tools that once pushed the industry toward cleaner technology. Unverified based on available sources whether any future U.S. administration will revive a more transparent, science‑aligned approach, but for now the policy divergence is clear: some governments are sharpening the spotlight on automaker emissions, while Washington is dimming it.
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