G.M.'s Strategy Switch

Ever since the Clean Air Act was amended and toughened by Congress over their strenuous objections in 1970, automakers have argued loudly that the law's standards for exhaust emissions on '75 and '76 model cars will be all but impossible to meet. For all their efforts, they failed to make their plight quite believable to William D. Ruckelshaus. Earlier this year his Environmental Protection Agency summarily rejected the automakers' application for a delay in the deadline. Last week, in a major change of strategy, General Motors disclosed that its scientists were farther along in meeting the new requirements than company officials had previously admitted. But now, G.M. officers said, it is time for the Government and the oil industry to take some lumps.

Speaking to a meeting of the American Petroleum Institute, G.M. President Edward Cole said that on some experimental cars equipped with platinum-based catalytic converters, which reduce the pollutants spewed out in untreated exhaust by 90% or more, G.M. has been "able to meet emission levels for 1975 and 1976." While he insisted that G.M.'s prototypes are still a long way from being mass-producible equipment, Cole announced that the company has already begun to order some tooling, which suggests that officials feel the remaining bugs can be shaken out. G.M. has also arranged to buy 420,000 ounces of South African platinum and palladium, two of the so-called noble metals that chemically transform toxic pollutants into harmless substances inside the converter chambers.

Having tipped G.M.'s hand, Cole proceeded to set a high ante for the other players. Since lead and two other elements used in most U.S. gasoline render platinum useless as an exhaust purifier, Cole said that they will have to be drastically reduced in fuel used by cars built after 1974. That, he warned, will have a "large impact" on the petroleum industry. As for the Government, said Cole, it may well have to compromise on its requirement that converters last 50,000 miles without maintenance. The farthest that G.M.'s prototypes have gone without trouble is about 20,000 miles. Both the oil industry and the Government are sure to take issue with parts of G.M.'s proposals. In fact, the three-way debate over how to meet the law's antipollution standards is likely to continue right up to the start of production of '75-model cars.

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