The following is a brief summary of the Final Rule published on June 27th in the Federal Register from the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) which revises 40 CFR Part 86 - Subparts A and S, CONTROL OF EMISSIONS FROM NEW AND IN-USE HIGHWAY VEHICLES AND ENGINES.
This new Final Rule requires Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM's) of both vehicles and engines to make available to any person engaged in the repairing or servicing of motor vehicles or motor vehicle engines all information necessary to make use of the On Board Diagnostic (OBD) systems and any information for making emission-related repairs, including any information for making emission-related repairs that are provided by the OEM’s to their franchised dealers.
This rulemaking requires that this information be made available on 1994 and later Light Duty Vehicles and Light Duty Trucks and 2005 and later Heavy Duty Vehicles and Engines weighing 14,000 pounds GVW or less. It is required that OEM's make this information available in full text on OEM Web sites. These web sites must be launched within six months of the date of this rulemaking and the information required by this rule shall be made available for each model vehicle and/or engine within six months of their public introduction. If the OEM's prefer not to make the information available on their Web sites, then those Web sites must indicate the alternative for obtaining the information and/or ability to perform re-initialization. Also beginning with the 2008 model year, EPA requires that all OEM systems will be designed in such a way that no special tools or processes will be necessary to perform re-initialization.
The EPA is requiring that OEM's establish a three-tiered approach for access to their Web-based service information. These tiers include:
- Short-term access for a period of 24-72 hours,
- Mid-term access for a period of 30 days, and
- Long-term access for a period of 365 days.
The OEM's are required to make full access to all of their Web sites and not limit it to just one make or model.
With regard to the issue of cost, EPA will not be finalizing any price caps for access to each of the tiers described above. However, prior to the official launch of OEM Web sites, each OEM will be required to present to the Administrator a specific outline of what will be charged for access to each of the tiers. OEM's must justify these charges, and submit to the Administrator information on specific parameters, which include but are not limited to, the following:
- The price the manufacturer currently charges their branded dealers for service information.
- The price the manufacturer currently charges persons other than branded dealers for service information.
- The estimated number of persons to whom the manufacturer would be expected to provide the service information following implementation of today's requirements.
This rulemaking also requires that OEM's allow direct simple hyperlinking to their Web sites from government Web sites and from all automotive-related Web sites, such as aftermarket service providers, educational institutions, and automotive associations. The EPA also requires that its Administrator have access to these Web sites at no charge to the EPA.