As we await more details of the plan, there is one talking point that I’m seeing in a variety of media sources:

Obama’s proposed change in rules would for the first time combine pollution reduction from vehicle tailpipes with increased efficiency on the road. It would save 1.8 billion barrels of oil through 2016 and would be the environmental equivalent of taking 177 million cars off the road, said senior administration officials speaking anonymously, ahead of the announcement.

Let’s do some math here . . .

One barrel of oil, when refined, produces 19.6 gallons of gasoline. If the Obama plan saves 1.8 billion barrels of oil between today and 2016, a total of 35.3 billion gallons of gasoline will not be used by American drivers over that span. As the average tax on a gallon of gasoline is 45.6 cents, this means some $16.1 billion in tax revenue (about $6.5 billion for the feds, and $9.6 billion for the states) will be lost between now and 2016.

So how do we make up for that $16.1 billion in lost revenue — which is supposed to fund the infrastructure projects (and jobs) that President Obama claims to value so highly?

As Henry Payne noted earlier, it is political suicide to increase gasoline taxes: even as states witnessed a drop-off in gas-tax revenue last summer — when Americans were driving less in the face of skyrocketing gas prices — state were loath to boost gas taxes to make up the shortfall. I wonder how many states have long-term infrastructure plans whose funding now needs to be adjusted, based on these White House projections.

Henry’s post also notes that Ford claims it can make a profit selling small cars that are made in America, but can either GM 2.0 or Chrysler 2.0 make the same claim?

And of course, we should also give a thought to what these new standards will do for car safety . . .