Gas guzzling over gas saving, for the win! That might be the immediate reaction to a federal proposal to permanently disable the fuel-saving tech feature. Or maybe the actual response is, “Finally!” Or possibly, “Nooo, for the love of clean air!” Either way, current EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin wants it axed.
In a social media post in May, Zeldin said that “everyone hates it” and suggested that the start-stop feature existed solely as a “climate participation trophy” for automakers. And he’s not entirely wrong.
According to The New York Times, the EPA subsidized the tech in 2012, thus encouraging OEMs to incorporate the feature into future products. Although availability has skyrocketed to the point of near-universal adoption, actual usage is likely far below the implementation rate. Also, yeah, consumers have complained about it, so Zeldin vowed to undo what his predecessors annoyingly allowed to continue. Per the NYT:
Most of the complaints fall in a few categories. Some skeptics believe that it doesn’t really save on gas, or that it adds wear and tear to the engine. Others worry about not having control of the car, or about having the air-conditioning turn off with the engine on hot days.
Manufacturers try to make the feature as seamless as possible. That might mean turning off the engine only during longer stops, or only if the air-conditioning isn’t drawing too much energy. Newer cars also have starter systems specifically designed for start-stop.
But that effort hasn’t quite made the feature beloved by everyone. In many models, it’s hard to miss when the engine shuts off and turns back on. Several tutorials on YouTube showing how to disable the feature have amassed over a million views.
Start/stop technology: where your car dies at every red light so companies get a climate participation trophy. EPA approved it, and everyone hates it, so we’re fixing it. pic.twitter.com/zFhijMyHDe
— Lee Zeldin (@epaleezeldin) May 12, 2025
This isn’t an empty threat. Fast-forward two months, and the “One Big Beautiful Bill” Act has been approved and signed into law. With it came retroactive forgiveness of penalties for automakers who haven’t been compliant with NHTSA’s CAFE standards since model year 2022. With no financial repercussions for missing fuel economy targets, automakers may see little benefit in continuing efficiency tech like start-stop, which gives Zeldin’s EPA additional leverage on the matter. As Automotive News recently reported:
The EPA also awards credits for automakers that include specific technologies with apparent emissions reductions that may not show up in lab testing, including stop-start. The agency under Zeldin has promised to reconsider the greenhouse gas emissions standards that enable the credits.
“If there’s no CAFE program that can be enforced, and there’s not a greenhouse gas standard that requires improvement, that would remove the incentive for automakers to put in this technology,” said Chris Harto, senior policy analyst at Consumer Reports.
The intent is to reinvigorate the manufacturing of gas-powered vehicles. To support that mission, the bill also discontinued the federal EV tax credit, which has existed in some form since 2008. Vehicle production may be affordable again, but not for EVs or consumers interested in efficient cars, including hybrids.
That’s too bad when studies show increased interest in the electrified market and recent sales reflecting that sentiment. Regarding first-quarter sales, the U.S. Department of Energy reported:
About 22% of light-duty vehicles sold in the first quarter of the year in the United States were hybrid, battery electric, or plug-in hybrid vehicles, up from about 18% in the first quarter of 2024. Among those categories, hybrid electric vehicles have continued to gain market share while battery electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid vehicles have remained relatively flat, according to estimates from Wards Intelligence.
The strong hybrid sales carried over into the second quarter as well, with several car companies reporting growth in that sector, including Ford, Hyundai, and Toyota. Opposite that, how much money will automakers save now that they can effectively shrug off fuel efficiency and environmental concerns? Plenty. Reuters breaks down the costs:
Last year, Chrysler-parent Stellantis paid $190.7 million in civil penalties for failing to meet U.S. fuel economy requirements for 2019 and 2020 after paying nearly $400 million for penalties from 2016 through 2019. GM previously paid $128.2 million in penalties for 2016 and 2017…
Last year, Tesla said it received $2.8 billion in global revenue from regulatory credits it earns from selling zero-emission EVs and sells to other automakers seeking to meet vehicle emissions targets.
Senate Republicans estimate that car companies would save approximately $200 million in waived fees. That’s a pretty penny, but it’s not nearly enough to offset an OEM’s tariff-related losses, oh, but I digress.
With no start-stop, consumers do lose out, despite their love-hate (hate-kinda like?) relationship with that button with a circled A on it. Because it honest-to-goodness does function as designed. Says the NYT:
Though the technology has its skeptics, research says it does effectively cut fuel consumption and emissions. Most studies on start-stop technology show real-world fuel use reductions of 5 to 10 percent, depending on driving patterns. One study found that start-stop begins to save fuel when the engine is off for as little as seven seconds during an idling period.
In newer vehicles, a start-stop information screen can be scrolled through via the IP and/or the center display. There you’ll find fuel savings based on the amount of time the engine was shut off during your commute, as well as reasons why the system is unavailable even though activated. Kind of like hypermiling, every stop can be turned into a gamification of fuel efficiency. Sweet.
But the disappearance of the start-stop credit seems more a matter of when, not if. But that doesn’t necessarily mean automakers will remove the feature, or does it? A decade ago, the estimated cost of a start-stop unit itself was only a few hundred bucks. According to an Edmunds report at the time:
While stop-start systems have typically been included in the overall price premium for hybrids, many industry analysts say their actual cost is between $300 and $400.
Ford Motor Company recently announced a $295 price for its first stand-alone stop-start system, offered as an option on the automatic transmission version of the 1.6-liter EcoBoost model of the 2013 Ford Fusion SE sedan. By comparison, a full hybrid system can add $6,000 or more to the price of a car.
These days, opting for a hybrid adds about the same or less in cost. With more models out there, it really comes down to the vehicle build, especially when some automakers consider the hybrid a mid-level trim and above offering.
When comparing apples to apples, though, based on Kelley Blue Book data, the 2020 Fusion hybrid (the sedan’s last model year) cost just $3,500 more than its regular ol’ gas sibling. With the vehicle variants closer in price, perhaps the unit cost for a start-stop system decreased as well. And perhaps that’s enough to keep the feature around? There are other perks in its favor, says the NYT:
David Cooke of the Clean Transportation Program says that regardless of what the E.P.A. does, keeping start-stop is a “no-brainer” for manufacturers: It costs a small amount to implement, and it results in considerable fuel savings, which is a selling point to customers.
Start-stop would also help manufacturers stay under the emissions limit even if the off-cycle credits are canceled. That’s because the standard treadmill tests capture some — just not all — of the feature’s real-world savings. So car companies would still have reason to include the technology.
In Europe, and most other countries, start-stop technology is considered standard. In the United States, each automaker has adopted the feature at different rates. Volkswagen received the stop-start credit on 95 percent of its internal combustion cars sold in America, while Mazda received it for just 5 percent.
To counter that is Rasto Brezny, executive director of the Manufacturers of Emissions Controls Association, who also spoke with the NYT:
…[He] couldn’t predict if getting rid of the credit would change the number of cars with start-stop. But he did note that regulation has always been the driver of clean technology: “Nobody would put a catalytic converter on a vehicle unless they had to.”
Corporations save money, and consumers lose out on saving theirs? Neat! Even if you consider start-stop a nuisance and are irritated with having to deactivate it every single time you get into the car, you’d no longer be allowed to decide your level of annoyance. Honestly, I’m always annoyed anyway, so why take away my option to at least save some money whenever I scowl behind the steering wheel? Sigh. Maybe they’ll let us have a blank button as a reminder of what was.
Does start stop save every driver a noticeable amount of fuel? No. Does it save a noticeable amount of fuel from the total vehicle fleet? Definitely yes.
If it’s annoying for you turn it off, but it’s doing good for everyone collectively.
the issue is you cannot leave it off. it has to be disabled every time you drive. and if you do this the little restart battery does not receive a charge in at least a few brand/models. I know of a GM vehicle that had this occur. once they little aux battery was dead the whole car was dead. pretty weird to me.
That sounds like some poor engineering, or terrible management.
Oh, you said GM already.
Sounds like bullshit to me
The Aux battery is not for starting the car. It runs the electronis and such while the engine is stopped so that drain is not on the main battery which is used for starting.
When the early Honda Insight loses power in the tiny main 12 volt battery, you are yard art.
Primary complaint I’ve heard.
Regulators think about the average car, but nobody drives one. You know if you’re stopping at a lot of red lights regularly. If you live or commute downtown, you’ll save more than average. If you live in a rural area, SS (let’s not be juvenile here) won’t do much for you.
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I have auto start/stop in my Prius, and I would assume most hybrids have it. It’s always worked well for me, I’ve never even noticed any hesitation or shuddering when the gas engine starts back up. Although I guess I wouldn’t, considering I have an electric motor to keep me moving before the gas engine kicks in, so it’s relatively seamless.
That’s the thing though, it’s a feature that works great in hybrids but is annoying in ICE-only models. With a hybrid there’s no hesitation because (as you note) the electric motor gets you moving before the gas engine kicks in.
With just a gas engine, the trouble is the gas engine doesn’t restart until you take your foot off the brake. There’s about a 2-second lag between taking your foot off the brake and being able to accelerate. It’s not the worst thing, but it is definitely a notable annoyance.
It’s also all about the size of the electric motor. In a hybrid (even mild hybrid with a BSG) you have a very strong motor that can very easily and gently bring the engine up to speed, while filling in some of the missing torque.
By comparison in an ICE start-stop system you basically have a beefed-up (but still dirt cheap) starter motor that has to get the engine running before you get your foot on the accelerator, all while being relatively smooth and seamless. It’s a massive NVH and controls engineering challenge, but most companies have it dialed in well enough that it’s not terrible to live with. I’d still happily pay more for a mild hybrid, soooo much smoother.
My most recent experience with a 12V system was in a rental Chevy Trailblazer a few months ago. By the time my foot made it from the brake to the accelerator the engine was running and ready to go. Maybe a quarter second delay.
10 years ago the 12V systems were really bad but that has changed.
Yes, but that’s in a 1.2L 4-banger. The Odyssey I rented recently had a noticeable half-second pause to refire its 3.5 V6, and after a harrowing unprotected left that shit got disabled every time I got in to drive.
My question is how will it hold up in the real world in the long run? I saw a previous-gen Malibu cranking for 3-4 seconds after an auto-stop in the Costco parking lot, and the elderly folks driving it were oblivious to the racket they were creating. How long until it just shuts itself off and doesn’t restart?
I’m definitely not looking forward to 15-20 years from now with traffic jams created by cars whose auto-stop has failed to auto-start. The systems can be as well designed as possible, but nothing will ever take into account Americans’ hatred for keeping their cars well maintained.
You are describing two poorly implemented systems. A previous generation Malibu would be at least a decade old.
As for durability – stop start has been around in Europe for much longer than the USA. It has been pretty much standard for about a decade. So far so good.
The starter-battery industrial cartel thinks it’s wonderful, and says we should too
So? What’s to say more recently implemented systems won’t have issues crop up in the next decade or two? European engines are a lot smaller and easier to start, not to mention that Europeans follow maintenance schedules a lot more closely and get rid of their cars a lot sooner at lower mileages. That’s a continent where Renault and Volkswagen are considered ‘reliable’ brands, mind you. AFAIC I would only use a car with a BAS/ISG start-stop system. Anything that relies on a traditional starter is pretty miserable, but to each their own.
I’ve always turned this feature off by default (and my car lets me keep it off in Individual mode). But my last tank of gas was an experiment where I left it on, to see what the difference would be. The answer is I went from 28.5mpg (all city) to 30.6mpg (all city). Not a huge difference.
But I found that my engine often stayed on at the longest stoplights, because for me, those are usually the ones right after I leave work, when my car is hot from sitting in the sun (which disables the feature). So I’m going to do another tank in the winter, to see if there’s a better difference. But for me, even though I am 99% a city driver, it was not worth it.
You got a nearly ten percent increase in fuel economy and you didn’t say anything about any downsides so presumably it was a better system than the crap you’d find on something like a Sentra or a 15 year old GM car, so why wasn’t it worth it?
I found it ever-so-slightly stressful to have my engine stop and start so often, especially when it was just for a couple of seconds. It got to the point where I would make the call as I rolled up to a light; if I thought it was about to turn green, I’d turn the system off for that light. Same with stop signs.
Also, I drive a manual, and while it’s quite smart at when the engine turns back on, I found it easier to stall when starting to move at a green (I’m not exactly sure why). For stop signs, if I didn’t want the car to turn off for half a second, which is maddening, I’d have to keep the clutch pushed in, which is fine, but against my nature.
Overall, I decided it was not worth it to save a few cents. I suspect that in the winter, it’ll make more of a difference, and be less annoying also. I’ll find out in January.
What manual vehicle comes with stop/start?
My 2016 Boxster has it. It does allow me to turn it off and leave it off. Not having to reset it to off every time I start up is the only way I’d find these systems acceptable.
Here is a typical scenario using the auto stop/start with a manual: Stop at red light behind a line of cars, system shuts down. Light turns green, everyone starts moving so push in the clutch and system starts up again. Someone stops accelerating and you have to hit the brakes, system shuts down but almost immediately you’re pushing the clutch back in and starting up again. It is so annoying it is useless but especially in a manual transmission.
Mine is a ’23 Integra, but my ’22 Civic Si had it too. The Acura’s innovation is that if you go into Individual Mode, you can turn ASS off permanently, instead of every time you start the car.
That “few cents” adds up to $126 per year if you are driving 15K miles a year and paying $3.50 a gallon.
I drive way less than that, but pay more. You’re right about the savings adding up. I figure I could probably save the same amount of gas by simply driving less exuberantly. I was hoping for a bigger gain though.
If you want to mandate removal of this feature, then mandate replacement of traffic lights with roundabouts so we don’t need to sit motionless burning fuel at a red light when nobody is coming from the other direction.
This times infinity.
Not far from my house, there is a busy intersection of two main roads. It used to be a traffic circle, but it was reconfigured with lights that seem to take a few minutes to cycle through turning and straight signals.
Eejits!
Sometimes I wish we didn’t defeat the Brits.
Just moved to the area north of Indianapolis. Carmel, IN is leading the way here- they have replaced nearly all the traffic light intersections the city controls with roundabouts (more than 120). Traffic incidents at intersections have decreased almost 40% and fatal accidents by 75%. The adjacent communities are also generally roundabout-first. It’s truly a pleasure to drive around here.
In an ideal world I’d agree with you, but in reality I’d get so tired about all the stupid people constantly having fender benders and never managing to understand how circles work (think of it as a new road you’re turning onto and you have a yield sign instead of a stop sign).
Or I guess the optimistic view is that if we had a lot more of them, people would finally learn.
See my comment below– people do get used it it. The more common they are, the more likely they will.
Definitely! As frustrating as it is to deal with human bivalves who find circles confusing, they’re far better than lights. I don’t know about reduction in minor crashes overall (see: confused idiots), but they must certainly be safer, particularly as the number of intersecting streets rises, since the consequently long light cycles further incentivize morons to try to beat lights to avoid a long wait, which they often accelerate to do. If the potential high speed weren’t enough, for the person who just got a green, it’s not uncommon for traffic in other lanes to block the view of the cross street so they can’t see the moron trying to beat the light.
Crashes at roundabouts tend to be minor fender-benders. Collisions at four way intersections are usually T-bones, which are the most deadly variety of crashes.
The roads near my offices are nearing the completion of a multi-year improvement project that widened the main road to two lanes, and replaced nearly every intersection with a roundabout. (These aren’t true two-lane roundabouts; only one lane goes completely around.) People at work complain about them so ferociously you would think that the state had installed something genuinely annoying like speed tables.
That’s gradually happening, but each roundabout is very costly to build. In developed areas, there may be no room for the circle. And when roundabouts get congested, you still have to stop and wait to enter.
Honestly? It’s all pretty dumb. The tech is sort of dumb. The response to it though is even dumber. And the idea that the EPA is wasting their time trying to eliminate it is pretty frustrating, but exactly what you’d expect from this administration so… yeah.
I have a large button on the dash that I can press to deactivate ASS (I assume this is the correct acronym for Auto Start-Stop?). So while for the most part ASS does not bother me too much, I will on occasion hit the button on hot days when I’d like the AC to keep running.
I’m sure some people have this hidden behind a million menus in a touch screen, but that’s the manufacturers fault for promoting awful UI. For those of us with an access to a button, it’s fine and really doesn’t impact me much.
We really do live in the dumbest timeline.
We really, really do.
Although I’ve only had the auto start/stop feature on one vehicle, it never bothered me, and I never turned it off. In my mind, this is much ado about nothing.
The customers of mine* who actively hate this feature are the same ones that have never used cruise control in their lives.
Fun fact (at least on Ford and Mini vehicles): if you put the vehicle in Sport mode, it automatically disables the auto start/stop feature.
*Yes, mostly Boomers.
Same on Audis – if you want the AC to stay on or you are anticipating an intersection where you may need a quick start just flip the shifter to S from D and auto start stop is off and you get faster throttle response. This is absolutely a nothing issue.
It’s even less of an issue for me. My household’s only car with ASS (2020 RAV4) is activated at 0mph and holding the brake at around 50% pressure. Probably 90% of the time ASS activates is because I actively want it to because of I know I’ll be waiting a bit (knowing I have a full light cycle, drive-thrus, etc.). Just routine driving and normal brake pressure almost never activates it.
My current Audi (2021 A6 allroad) has the 48v mild hybrid which means the shut down and start up are super seamless and it shuts down before even coming to a stop. My previous Audi (2017 A4 allroad) was not hybrid but similarly to yours if you weren’t pressing the brake hard it wouldn’t shut off. I was taught to feather the brakes for a smooth stop so when I reach full stop I am at 5-10% pedal pressure and actually wondered if the ASS system failed or had been shut off because it basically never activated.
Exactly. I have to admit, I was a mildly alarmed at first as well. I don’t mind this style of implementation (for ICE vehicles) and almost never even bother turning ASS off now that I understand how it works .
This is one of those issues that seems to have taken on a life of it’s own and now people are mostly opposed for opposition’s sake. Yeah some of the first systems sucked as always, ie. shoulder belts, fuel injection, giant ass screens for all controls, etc. but pretty much every manufacturer has ASS figured out by now.
This new policy / regulation / tweet is only going to apply to systems being developed currently – BMW isn’t going to go back and reprogram someone’s 2013 three owner 5-series because of this change – so it’s a solution to a problem which has already been solved.
Losing the “freedom” to have a mandatory system that negligibly reduces emissions and fuel burn by accelerating the wear and tear on the engine via repeated starting and stopping.
There’s no reason why automakers can’t keep the system, hell, most probably will, but now when the customers ask for them to make the button to turn it off to do so permanently (as in you turn it off and it stays off, only turns on when you hit the button again) instead of turning back on every time you start the car again, the automakers can actually do that, and everyone will rejoice!
This isn’t a reduction in freedom. There’s nothing stopping you (besides maybe laws and common sense) from turning your car off at a stop light if you like it so much.
That’s not a practical alternative. Turning off the car tends to turn everything off, lights, camera, action. It’s a multi-step process that works differently in every car. The current ASS function is automatic, so it’s better.
As stated in the comment you replied to, automakers are unlikely to get rid of the system, they’ll just make it so you can disable it and not have to re-disable it every time you turn your car on. In all likelihood the next president will be a democrat who repeals all of Trump’s changes and automakers understand that, so they’re not going to take it out if it just has to be put back in again in a few years.
I like the way you think.
I’m just being realistic. Congress refused to put Trumps cuts into law, so they’ll come back in his term. The Republicans tried to repeal Obamacare some ungodly amount of times when they had nowhere near the votes needed to repeal it, then the moment they had the votes on paper they didn’t do shit because they were rabblerousing to appeal to their base.
This is probably why so many countries are agreeing to Trump’s Tariffs on them, because they know he’ll be out of office in under 4 years and the next president will almost certainly repeal everything the last president did because we have big political swings in the country and god help you if you’re a sensible moderate running for office in either party because the party officials certainly won’t support you.
I worked pretty good on my ATS (just like the other common boogeyman cylinder deactivation did), so perhaps it shouldn’t be judged in 2025 by the standards of GM panicking when gas was $5 and strapping it onto the GMT900 trucks that are halfway rotted into the ground by now anyway and people who spent 80 grand on a new truck and permanently disable it immediately because of “vibes”.
Lots of people seem to have formed their opinions about these systems based on the terrible first-generation systems that came out in the Great Recession — or the cheap ones you find in penalty-box rental cars.
A good system (like those with 48v electrical systems or mild hybrids) is effectively transparent.
Oh absolutely, I’ve had some rentals over the past couple years and the most grating system was in a Soul, the neatest (and most thought out) was in a Corolla Cross. The others all fell in between but towards the toyota.
Was the Corolla Cross a hybrid or ICE? I’m just curious because I don’t particularly mind the way Toyota implemented ASS in our ICE RAV4 and I was wondering if it’s the same across the board. I’ve driven hybrid Toyotas as rentals and, as Sam Gross said, it’s pretty seamless.
It was gas-only. I was pretty impressed that it took into account brake pedal pressure, cabin temperature (and had a setting to toggle how aggressive it could be), along with other more common considerations like battery condition, engine temp, etc.
It reminds me a bit of when people were ripping perfectly good EFI systems out of even 90s cars (C4 Corvettes/pre-Modular Mustangs/Pre-LS Camaros, etc) to switch them to carbs because they didn’t “trust them” (either for reliability or making power or whatever) after the various shitty systems GM, Ford and Chrysler strapped onto cars in the early 80s. For the enthusiast forums still around from that time, there are a lot of forum posts about people bragging about doing it and/or talking about doing it in the early 2000s.
I’d say the problem back then was people were used to being able to swap out some parts on their smog equipped V8s from the 70s and 80 and make significant gains in power. Tuning had not really been developed at all for the EFI systems so the easiest way to increase power was to go back to a carb system. But yes, some people are pretty dumb when it comes to mods. For instance, back in the 80s a guy at the tire shop I went to was bragging about removing the turbo from his SVO Mustang in order to save gas. I was thinking, yeah, now you have a 4 cylinder with less compression than a non-turbo.
Yeah but a lot of them are still shit, particularly anyone that shuts off when the a/c is on high can fuck right off
Conservatives afraid of change?! Unheard of.
We had a 2020 F-150 and the A/C would nearly die when the feature kicked on (off?). Not so fun on a 100 degree day.
I’m fine with them allowing it to remain off if it has been switched off. I have no problems with the stop start on my car, my wife can’t stand it in hers.
Now if the NHTSA really wants to get on my good side, can we finally have European matrix LEDS??
I suspect that you’re right — the state will now be maintained across restarts.
But matrix LEDs have been allowed for 18 months now. Tesla, Rivian, and Audi have all shipped them.
Because you enjoy sky high insurance premiums because your headlight now costs in the $1000s to replace instead of under $100?
They already cost in the $1000s. What US market car built in the last 10 years has headlights for under $100?
Dodge Journey
Gen 4 Ram pickups you can get one for under $100. Lots are in the couple of hundred range – as long are you’re talking halogens and not LEDs or HIDs.
I forgot how long they produced those. I’m curious if there are any non dodge vehicles that meet this requirement.
Your 10 year stipulation is the problem. There are plenty of 11-25 year old cars with headlight assemblies for under $100, and plenty of those still on the road, and really that’s more what I was referring to – that in the past 10 years headlights have gone up 10x in price.
I had a 2025 Chevy Trialblazer as a rental on a recent business trip that had stop/start so I decided to do an experiment and my very urban commute in the Detroit area. 2 days with stop / start and 2 without it. Without 26 mpg vs 32 mpg with. Seems well worth it to me.
I did have to learn not to slowly creep forward at a light.
Why do people do this? Is this a phone staring thing?
I frequently have the car in front of me stop at a red light a full car length behind the car in front and then slowly creep forward when the light is still red. Why?
For me it is just matching the distance to the car in front. Car in front creep up, so I creep up. With Stop / Start I just sat there an maybe by the end of the light there was a half car length in front of me. 12V Stop / Start made me notice the creeping. (I’ve driven hybrids for more than 15 years but they creep on electric power)
I can’t tell you why people stop way back and then inch forward. I also can’t tell you why people slowly inch into an intersection instead of just waiting at the stop line for the light to change.
The best implementation for auto start/stop is with a manual transmission, when you press the clutch the engine kicks on right away, the delay is not as annoying with an auto transmission since I usually press the clutch right when the light is about to turn green. In an auto transmission car, you have to release the brake and lurch the car forward and brake again. Other situation when you stop at your driveway, the car shuts off but when you place it on Park, it will kick on again. The exception to this was a VW Jetta I got as a rental, the car stayed off in Park.
I have a manual with stop-start and I’ve liked it more than I thought I would, I think specifically because of the manual. I can usually keep the clutch in while I slow and assess how long a stop might be, if I expect to sit for a while and let the system cut the engine, or keep the clutch in because I’ll start moving shortly. Basically acting like the on/off switch without having to click the button each time. The button being next to the shifter makes that not such a hassle though, if it were buried elsewhere like the lower left of the dash or in a touchscreen maybe not.
C’mon Autoopian, this is an extremely click baity title. Please don’t slowly become Jalopnik.
What they are advocating for is start/stop memory, whereby the car will remember the last setting saved, instead of defaulting to on with every ignition cycle. This is a non-issue, and something that auto manufacturers can easily change.
It’s the easiest solution. If I decide to turn it off, it should stay off. If my spouse wants to turn it on, let it stay on.
I barely notice it on my 2018 Ford F150 and at this point any only occasionally need to turn it off on really hot days (which is a conveniently placed button tap away). And at gas prices that will NOT be going down if demand goes up, I really don’t mind saving money without having to think about it.
Can’t wait for all the customers whining about this to start lodging complaints about how much more they have to fill their tanks, all with zero hint of irony.
I used to work in biodiesel back prior to the Great Recession (that makes me feel very old…), and I got very familiar with the Bush era RFS Act (Renewable Fuels Standard) and CAFE legislation from where this sort of thing comes. Automakers have to achieve a certain fleet fuel economy to achieve some fanciful average mpg. They get mpg credits sorta for employing various technologies, regardless of what they actually do toward any real life mpgs. The one that stuck in my craw the most was GM’s “Flex Fuel”, which was just a cheap ethanol sensor and a few lines of code (total cost single digit dollars). They put it on EVERY car they made, and only charged $100 or something trivial for it, because it effectively doubled their fleet mpg under the assumption that every buyer who “selected” that option was filling up with neat (100%) ethanol half the time, and ethanol miles aren’t gas miles, so that’s zero gallons per mile. We all know that there’s almost nowhere in the entire country that’s even possible, but it made their 15mpg leviathan get 30mpg as far as compliance was concerned.
Start/stop is essentially the same thing, where it’s assumed every driver spends some ridiculous and unfathomably long time idling, while running every accessory at the max, and they get to claim a much higher than physically possible mpg boost for the fleet. Absolute nonsense, but cheap checkbox compliance.
I’m 100% on the green wagon, but killing start/stop isn’t going to hurt anyone in any way other than giving Orange Julius Caesar credit for some stupid nonsense that isn’t worthy of a shrug. If they extend that effort to killing ALL of the similar compliance cheating devices and strategies, and start forcing manufacturers to actually produce what they put on the tin, I’ll give them a standing ovation. Obviously, this is nothing more than a cheap stick in the eye to the lib-ruls for the red behatted to hoot over, so that won’t happen. I’m definitely not getting worked up over this one.
100% agreed here. The number of things that have allowed automakers to effectively lie about their fuel economy standards is… absurd.
The footprint rule and SUVs-as-trucks needs to go next.
Flexfuel credits were basically a giveaway for the Detroit 3 to greatly improve their fuel economy on full size trucks. (Which are the vehicles the made flex fuel not vehicles that could actually benefit from the extra octane in E85)
Stop / Start isn’t nearly the same. It actually works if you turn it on. As I stated elsewhere when I experimented with it on a Trailblazer rental it boosted fuel economy from 26 mpg to 32 mpg in city driving.
Killing the feature is stupid and mean, so it might happen. The fix that would make everyone semi-happy is to toggle ASS on or off depending on the switch position.
I don’t mind it, I just want to have the option to turn it off if it sucks. In my RAM, it’s powered by the 48V mild hybrid system, so it’s really not jarring like some of the early vehicles with it that I had and I leave it on. But some systems are really horribly implemented. Most of the recent model year cars that I have driven are pretty good implementations of it.
Hybridized versions of start/stop seem to have the best implementations. My old boss had a Ram with the hybrid start/stop and it was smooooth compared to my wife’s ICE-only implementation. I had an Audi hybrid rental last month, and that too was barely noticeable.
Someone down below made the note that it should be easy and cost effective for most manufacturers to move to, at minimum, mild hybrids so the start/stop style systems can be smoother and less intrusive/noticeable. The Audi I rented was stopping the engine before I would come to a stop, and it took the better part of the first day of driving around for me to notice. It seems like an easy lift.
I agree. Plus it gets the other benefits of some additional torque off the line and the Ram also uses it to smooth out the transmission shifts. It’s a reasonably slick system. I test drove one with and one without when I was buying and it was noticeable. There’s a button to turn it off, but I’ve never used it.
I hated the feature so much I figured out how to use OBD2 to set it to off permanently. The most annoying was that every time I parked the car there would be 2 cycles of the auto on/off, one as I came to a stop and then once again when I shifted into park. Even when driving the timing seemed just slightly off so that I had to change the way I drived to accomodate it.
I won’t defend ASS (Auto-Start-Stop).
It adds extra weight via supplemental batteries to operate the vehicle when in Stop mode, the additional electrical cables for it, more load on the alternator to charge both batteries in concert, and never mind the additional wear to the motor and starter over time. Although they are, to a degree, designed to tolerate those conditions, it’s still a net-negative for longevity of the components and nearly every automotive engineer I’ve read discussing it agrees with this assessment.
At a minimum, dragging around the extra weight for these supplementary systems will negate the already-minute 10ths of a gallon saved. Replacement of any components in the system also negates any fuel savings for the end user. The only place where systems like this even remotely make sense are in hybrid applications where the electric drive can be used before the ICE motor comes into play.
Those are the facts. We’re all welcome to argue one side or the other, but when you disregard the data, you’re just discussing ideology at that point.
I own a Subaru with auto-start/stop. While I really dislike how it is implemented in my particular vehicle (the restarts are obnoxious), I’m puzzled by your claim that the technology requires supplemental batteries. My Subaru has one normal car-sized battery, and no other batteries. I’ve worked on countless other ICE vehicles with auto-start/stop, and I’ve never encountered one that had more than one battery as a result of the feature.
Gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles do typically have a separate battery for starting the engine, but I can’t think of any traditional ICE vehicle that uses a separate battery for auto-start/stop. Maybe there are some, but it’s definitely a rarity.
The starter & alternator are not really any different size/weight wise, either. So auto-start/stop doesn’t really require “dragging around the extra weight for these supplemental systems” as you claim.
Regardless, for the record, I turn it off when driving my car.
My brother just went through a thing with his ’18 Pacifica earlier this year. While a lot of the troubleshooting was happening, they continuously pointed to the battery that was responsible for the start/stop system. I figured it was a weird FCA thing, because my wife’s Kia Soul has one battery as well. (And suffers from the same, intrusive restart as your Subaru) But I guess there are probably some outliers that use auxiliary batteries as manufacturers were trying to figure out the best implementations of the start/stop system.
At least some Chrysler uses a small second battery to provide power to the vehicle electronics when stop/start is active. My bonus son has 2 batteries in his Wrangler and when the small one went bad it wouldn’t do stop/start and of course turned on the CEL.
Aux batteries are not uncommon in modern vehicles. My ’23 Jeep has one as did the ’13 Mercedes I had.
Those second batteries don’t start the engine. That’s the biggest load on the battery, and why we measure capability in Cold Cranking Amps. You’d never use a small 12v battery for that purpose.
Not all stop start systems use a second battery, in fact most don’t.
Perhaps, but mine does and that matters to me. I suppose that’s why there’s folks on both sides of this fence.
I guess the answer is to not buy Chrysler products as they seem to be the ones that use 2 batteries and a lot of extra stuff that other brands don’t.
What fucking data did you bring up?
Unnecessary expletives are a great way to bring up a counter argument. Users who behave like you drag the overall curve of the commentariat here downward. That said, if you enjoy Auto-Start-Stop, I’m happy for you.
Nice fucking comment.
I think what brings down the commentary is some high-handed appeal to data when you didn’t mention any data. It’s FoxNews shit. So if you have some data, please provide it. Otherwise, you’re just talking ideology as well, which I know you lament.
What a framing of this headline.
Anyways, the annoyance to fuel savings ratio of this “feature” is among the worst of anything ever invented.
First thing I bought for my ’24 Gladiator was an in-line bypass for the ASS system. Keeps it off all the time.
Also, I agree with your assessment of the phrasing of the headline.
It’s like the site wants to drum up support for this useless feature by reminding everyone that Bad Orange Man is getting rid of YOUR FREEDOM.
Pretty lowest-common-denominator stuff; something I’d expect to see at partisan rags like the old site.
Be better, Autopian staff.
I think this “useless feature” works pretty well.
It’s implementation by inferior manufacturers isn’t the fault of the feature.
By the way, I think the dumb ass current President is indeed trying to get rid of our freedom. Get the rich richer and eff the rest is the signal I’m seeing.YMMV. I’m sure that it does.
I think hybrids of all forms do away with the annoyance. I’ve driven a base X5 with the mild hybrid system and you don’t even notice the start stop/the AC keeps running when the engine is off, and the torque fill does away with the initial stutter of the engine restarting.
I’m genuinely not sure why mild hybrid systems aren’t more widespread…it seems like a relatively low cost/high yield way to save some gas and reduce emissions. But unfortunately for a lot of people hybrid is a dirty word….
Hopefully there’s no resurgence of this junk later on.
Mild hybrid does mostly seem like a win win, I expect to see more of those.
I think most people are fine or indifferent to hybrids especially now that Toyota has shown their reliability, but don’t really grasp the differences in mild vs. full systems – or really any of the systems, see PHEVs – so it ends up being a tough sell. GM was the only one I can recall really made an effort in non-premium cars over here, but it offered most of the packaging compromises then associated with a regular hybrid but nowhere near the fuel savings.
The mild CX-90 shows a tangible improvement in the city EPA rating but slapping hybrid labels on it might put too high an expectation on it against Highlanders, and the PHEV can kinda carry the torch for the model there.
I don’t have the data in front of me, but there are way, way, way more CX90 PHEVs in my area than inline 6 ones. To be fair, I live in DC where the technology can be used to its fullest and the average person is probably more environmentally mindful than, say, the average person in Nebraska…but it’s a little odd to me because the system seems so half baked.
Pretty much every CX90 horror story is about the PHEV one, the EV range is mediocre, and when operating as a hybrid it somehow gets worse MPG than the base inline 6. You’re also paying a big premium for it, usually $3-5,000 over a comparable ICE/mild hybrid one.
To me it seems like the straight 6 is a much, much better buy…but you may be right, people might see the 24/28 MPG rating…and while that’s excellent by 3 row SUV standards it can’t match the Toyota or even Kia/Hyundai hybrids, although those do way worse in the real world. Most people in the Santa Fe hybrids are seeing mid to high 20s combined.
The 24/28 is definitely a nice feather in their cap to have without having to get too detailed on how it works, and probably helps that nowadays hybrid versions of most cars are so common it’s a IYKYK thing to spot some of them. Also maybe the stop-start era is helping to bridge that gap in knowledge since most people will be exposed to it in some way and know OF it, but can say it actually does have an increase to rated MPG. (and maybe lead to more MHEVs down the road?)
I’m never quite close enough to CX-90s around to see which ones are what powertrain, but dealer inventories down my way seem to be more of the I6 which I would expect based on how most brands distribute PHEVs across markets even if it is a little chicken-or-egg.
Speaking of hybrid Mazdas I’ve been getting a ton of CX-50 ads and a lot of them are focused on the hybrid. I had wondered if Mazda might be a little quieter about it since it’s Toyota tech and reviews were a little lukewarm but it seems like inventory is pretty available too.
Yeah I’ve looked at listings for CX50 hybrids and there are plenty of them out there, usually with money on their hoods. I’m not sure if I’d say reviews were mixed, I think most were pretty positive…there was just a very vocal minority that were offended that it didn’t drive like the Turbo model which…well, duh.
The people that like Mazda REALLY like Mazda and have pretty unwavering ideas about what a Mazda is and isn’t. A borrowed last generation hybrid powertrain and eCVT are certainly not going to give you the zoom zoom fizz, but I’m not sure why people are expecting them to. Mazda had an opportunity to get a hybrid out ahead of schedule when the market was clamoring for them and they took it.
I’d personally take one over a comparable CRV or RAV hybrid for the uniqueness factor alone…and I’ve toyed with buying one or a Crown Signia for my next car but do worry that the lack of driver engagement might frustrate me. Anyway Mazda has their own full hybrid system nearing completion. I think that’s what people should wait for before they judge.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s a smart choice and would be my first rec for anyone looking at the class, especially on the lower trims which gives you most of the popular features without sport frippery. Maybe lukewarm is bit harsh but seemed like the knocks that stood out are 1. Toyota NVH (Honda system has the edge there) and 2. the packaging, which is already a weak point for Mazdas. It seemed like they went into the program knowing they were going to use the Toyota system so it seems odd they had to do as much repackaging as they did to adapt it.
It’s all in how you spec the hybrid powertrain. My Ford PHEV has 190 combined HP and does a 0-60 in eight seconds, which feels faster than it reads. My last car was a Mk V GTI with turbo and I’ve never missed it! Yes, there’s the usual CVT drone, but it never lasts for long. The latest Prius is finally matching the performance of my 2013-2017 design!
I get 24-28 with my Mercedes GLK in mixed city-suburban driving, and it’s a 3.5l V6! Yes, it has ASS and I use it. Th engine lights up before I can move my foot form the brake pedal to the accelerator.
Mild hybrids don’t raise fuel economy stats much, so they might seem like a scam. But they can improve the driving experience.
From my experience, “climate participation trophy” is an appropriate description of stop-start systems. I track fuel economy very closely and I have never been able to detect a difference in MPG with a stop/start enabled or disabled.
“Most studies on start-stop technology show real-world fuel use reductions of 5 to 10 percent, depending on driving patterns.”
I haven’t read the methodology of these studies, but I am extremely skeptical of their claim of a 5 to 10 percent reduction in non-hybrid vehicles. I would love to read their methodology, but the EPA website that makes this claim does not offer any citations to support this claim (the AAA website briefly references a study of three vehicles, but gives few details beyond that). I would believe a small subset of drivers can save a meaningful amount of gas with these systems, but those are unique situations where hybrids would presumably offer far larger reductions fuel use.
There’s a lot of “up to” the quoted percentages (which top out at 7% in the linked studies, not 10% as the NYT claims).
If someone drives all day around Manhattan in a large V8 powered truck, OK, they might save 5%.
The typical user is presumably going to see much less, which is why adding these systems didn’t actually boost mpg numbers on window stickers. And why removing them won’t lower them either.
I agree “up to” is doing a lot of heavy lifting in their quoted percentages. I could save up to 99% of fuel by parking my truck on a flatbed and letting the engine shut off as the flatbed drives us away – that is undeniably true, yet a completely useless thing to claim.
I genuinely would like to see research on how effective these systems are. Again, I haven’t seen any reductions in fuel consumption, but I presume they work on some level. I get frustrated by dubious claims that don’t appear to match reality, particularly when these claims come from “studies” with no further information.
The whole reason that the systems earn a credit is because the effectiveness in the standardized testing is so low that it doesn’t make enough of a difference to move the numbers. So the mfg gets a back end credit to encourage them to add it.
Are you sure this is the correct headline? I hate to throw around the word clickbait but nowhere in there is there anything about “banning” stop start. You can still choose to buy a car with it or without it.
I was hoping it was an article about how the EPA was going to change their requirement for start/stop to always default to “ON”.
Yeah, the defaulting to on is 100% undeniably bureaucratic pat yourself on the back bullshit. Everyone who doesn’t like it turns it off every time, the only difference is the having to press the button. Exactly 0 more gallons of fuel will be burned.
It’s going to be really fucking funny when gas prices inevitably skyrocket again and vast swaths of the MAGA crowd suddenly can’t afford to put gas in their F250s and HD Silverados that they financed on 8 year loans at 12% APR to own the libs….but then again I’m sure it’s Biden or Obama’s fault.
My friend, have a cup of coffee and relax. It’s too early to be this upset.
I’m not feeling particularly relaxed these days as the current administration and its cult are waging war on the environment. I don’t really have a dog in the stop/start fight, but I’m going to continue to call them out on their destruction.
This. There really is no “relaxed” in these times we live in.
If you want to shout into the ether, it’s your blood pressure.
What is the internet for if not shouting into the ether?
But, is he wrong?
It’s something I’ve seen over and over as well and I struggle to sympathize with it. Buy way too much truck to start, spend way too much to lift it, customize it, make it your own (and end up really just looking generic as everyone else does the same thing). Then they drive 80+ down the highway and leave red lights like they live a quarter mile at a time. All with usually just a driver and an empty bed. Then complain that they can’t get ahead in life and it’s always someone elses fault. I just can’t anymore.
Gas prices effectively have a cap on them now, so “skyrocketing” isn’t going to happen absent a massive geopolitical shift. Basically, as soon as prices durably rise, shale producers ramp up and a supply glut is created, thereby lowering prices again. Also, I’d bet on prices going down somewhat in the near future if Europe follows through on replacing Russian gas with American LNG.
Everyone knows this now, so even events like the Iran strikes don’t really have a big effect on prices anymore. In my youth, that would have spiked prices. OPEC can affect things to a certain extent, but they’re constrained now.
If the EPA’s stance on start-stop is, “Let’s go after the real issues,” then I’d love to see the agency grow a spine and do exactly that. I know that’s just a disingenuous misdirect, but instead of policing our cars they should be:
Consumers aren’t the problem. The way products are made, and the way they get to my local area, are.
I mean…if everyone came together and decided to stop driving gas guzzlers, use more transit, drive electrified vehicles, etc. only it would certainly help a lot, but you’re not wrong. The vast majority of emissions are from corporations, air travel, and the military.
Maybe. There were some incredible improvements in air quality in urban areas around the world during the lockdowns. Not saying I want to go back there, but clearly not having huge numbers of vehicles on the road made a big difference in a short period of time.
But instead the EPA’s new stance is:
This. I get why our right leaning commentators are calling this a nothingburger, but it’s a small symptom of a much bigger and more concerning issue, which I think is important to call out.
“This. I get why our right leaning commentators…”
I’m neither right nor left-leaning; my perspective can’t be distilled into a simple label, but…there’s got to be maybe 3 commenters here who could possibly be described as right-leaning in this largely left-leaning echo chamber. You did, at least, call out the issue to those individuals.
This was my exact thoughts reading this. I don’t have start stop but I’ve not been annoyed by it (and honestly my commute would not benefit or be hassled by it). My annoyance is really about the obvious partisan take by Lee. Again, I fully support a pragmatic approach to say the subsidies don’t provide enough value (as I believe is the case here) but this screams “own the libs” more than anything to me.
It doesn’t matter to what extent I agree or disagree with the guy when his statement is so full of childish own the lib buzzwords that he sounds like a schoolyard bully trying to get under everyone’s skin.
EPA can’t really grow a spine when they’re being actively crushed out of existence.
I’ll address 2 of those.
EPA has failed on aviation fuel – leaded gas was supposed to be gone more than decade ago. On the other hand use of bunker fuel has been banned in US waters for more than a decade and was banned by international treaty globally a few years ago.
It doesn’t help that the FAA makes doing any modifications a big expensive PITA, even if it’s better for the environment, or literally just a paper approval to use unleaded fuel in an engine already built to use it.
The common thread on most of your list is they most likely have squads of Lobbyists to fight anything that will cut next quarter’s profits. There is no incentive to be more environmentally friendly financially unless regulations penalize them with fines.
Average Consumer does not have much say in this other than choosing a vehicle that best matches their actual use (vs. possible use…4wd HD truck).
It’s interesting how consumers have had their economic power stripped away from several angles, isn’t it?
-Cleaning up all the toxins that spew from Trump and MAGA’s mouths since they are all so full of shit and hot air
Although I don’t use it, auto stop/start has never really bothered me. My only dislike is the default in my Jeep as ‘on,’ whereas in my other vehicles it remains off until the magic button is pressed. Like other Jeep owners, I use a programmer to solve the minor inconvenience. To each, his own.