Not meeting emissions compliance targets is expensive business. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s (NHTSA) annual report, Stellantis has paid $190.6 million in penalties in 2025 for its inability to meet Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards.
Reuters reports that this sum is the culmination of payments required for both the 2019 and 2020 model years, in which the automaker fell short of CAFE requirements. The automaker paid $78.3 million to the feds back in March, while an additional $112.3 million was paid in June. The automaker has spent over $773 million on these emission fines since 2018.
Automakers can purchase credits from companies that exceed CAFE requirements, such as EV providers like Tesla and Rivian. This can be quite lucrative for these companies, with Tesla raking in a ridiculous $2.8 billion in global revenue from their sale in 2024 alone. Following President Trump’s decision to eliminate fines dating from model year 2022 and up, this revenue source will be dramatically reduced. In fact, Rivian has filed a motion in court, claiming that it cannot finalize transactions worth $100 million in credit revenue until NHTSA processes the MY2022 results.
NHTSA had also previously declared that the Biden Administration had overstepped its authority in assuming a high rate of electric vehicle adoption while calculating future rulesets. The previous administration’s plans would’ve cost automakers $14 billion in projected fines through 2032. When the rules were actually adopted at the end of last year, requirements were loosened and projected fines dropped to just $1.83 billion through 2031. Stellantis was quick to take advantage, reviving its Hemi V-8 engines just in time for MY2026.
Given the amount of money that Stellantis forked over in this recent wave of payments, it is easy to see why automakers without substantial electric model sales might support an emissions roll back.
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