President Barack Obama may have just taken the wraps off his new national fuel policy, but according to the state of California it’s not too soon to already begin work on the next stage of clean car regulations. The infamous California Air Resources Board (CARB) is known for being passionate about the environment, and this aspect of its character shone through when its chairman stated that despite Obama's California-inspired federal regulations the board "will be immediately getting to work on what the standards should be for beyond 2016".

Despite big strides from the federal government, California says it will be implementing a more stringent standard in the future beyond 2016 and the state is still working on its own vehicle emissions laws rather than adopting a larger national framework, Reuters reports.

Obama has already set the national fleet target a fairly high standard of 35.5mpg that must be achieved by 2016, as well as a requirement to cut average CO2 emissions to 250g/mile. Currently, carmakers are nowhere near these figures when examining their entire fleets, and with a time frame of just seven years we should see many more companies adopting hybrid and diesel technology.

Nevertheless, CARB insists that the government should be doing more to improve air quality and reduce greenhouse gas emissions and fuel consumption. California's status as an aggressive policymaker in environmental regulation is nothing new, and the state realizes just how much power it wields when it comes to the global auto market. The chair of CARB stated earlier that because of its large market share the state can move much on policy initiatives quicker and more aggressively than the federal government.