You may ask us to apply a higher in-use FEL for certain in-use vehicles, subject to the provisions of this section. Note that Sec. 1037.225 contains provisions related to changing FELs during a model year.
(a) Purpose. This section is intended to address circumstances in which it is in the public interest to apply a higher in-use FEL based on forfeiting an appropriate number of emission credits.
(b) FELs. We may apply higher in-use FELs to your vehicles as follows:
(1) Where your vehicle family includes more than one sub-family with different FELs, we may apply a higher FEL within the family than was applied to the vehicle's configuration in your final ABT report. For example, if your vehicle family included three sub-families with FELs of 200 g/ton-mile, 210 g/ton-mile, and 220 g/ton-mile, we may apply a 220 g/ton-mile in-use FEL to vehicles that were originally designated as part of the 200 g/ton-mile or 210 g/ton-mile sub-families.
(2) Without regard to the number of sub-families in your certified vehicle family, we may specify new sub-families with higher FELs than were included in your final ABT report. We may apply these higher FELs as in-use FELs for your vehicles. For example, if your vehicle family included three sub-families with FELs of 200 g/ton-mile, 210 g/ton-mile, and 220 g/ton-mile, we may specify a new 230 g/ton-mile sub-family.
(3) In specifying sub-families and in-use FELs, we would intend to accurately reflect the actual in-use performance of your vehicles, consistent with the specified testing and modeling provisions of this part.
(c) Equivalent families. We may apply the higher FELs to other families in other model years if they used equivalent emission controls.
(d) Credit forfeiture. Where we specify higher in-use FELs under this section, you must forfeit CO2 emission credits based on the difference between the in-use FEL and the otherwise applicable FEL. Calculate the amount of credits to be forfeited using the applicable equation in Sec. 1037.705, by substituting the otherwise applicable FEL for the standard and the in-use FEL for the otherwise applicable FEL.
(e) Requests. Submit your request to the Designated Compliance Officer. Include the following in your request:
(1) The vehicle family name, model year, and name/description of the configuration(s) affected.
(2) A list of other vehicle families/configurations/model years that may be affected.
(3) The otherwise applicable FEL for each configuration along with your recommendations for higher in-use FELs.
(4) Your source of credits for forfeiture.
(f) Relation to recall. You may not request higher in-use FELs for any vehicle families for which we have made a determination of nonconformance and ordered a recall. You may, however, make such requests for vehicle families for which you are performing a voluntary emission recall.
(g) Approval. We may approve your request if we determine that you meet the requirements of this section and such approval is in the public interest. We may include appropriate conditions with our approval or we may approve your request with modifications.