> which can pose a significant (and growing, as standards improve) obstacle for older cars.

At least for my state, the emissions test a car has to pass is whatever it was supposed to have passed when it was fresh off the assembly line. So older cars do not have to pass stricter newer standards that newer cars have to pass.

Now, granted, wear and tear will eventually result in an older car not passing its original standard, but at least the standard it has to pass is fixed, rather than a moving target.

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darrylb42 3 hours ago | parent [-]

BC stopped emission testing 10ish years ago because new cars almost never fail so there wasn't much value continuing the program.

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Scoundreller 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Dunno why these programs never took a sampling approach and data-mined which makes/models/years to target the next year/cycle.

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projektfu an hour ago | parent [-]

The only way to have affordable, ubiquitous testing stations is to make it universal. At least, in states that do not also require safety inspections. If only 10,000 cars were tested each year, nobody would buy the equipment.

	▲	Scoundreller 33 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Mass (low-value) testing is only more affordable if you value people’s time at $0/hr