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They are not "under attack. It's just that after all this time it's finally time to have the taxpayers quit subsidizing what are most frequently expensive toys. Best let the industry respond with vehicles people are willing to spend their own money on, rather than other people's money.
Vehicle drivers are reasonably expected to pay at least a large portion of the costs of maintaining the highways the utilize. In the case of fossil fuel powered vehicles, that revenue comes from fuel tax. There are many ways to get EV drivers to pay their share, rather it's "by the mile" or higher annual registrations.
Well, not so large really. The are expected, however, to pay something which EVs really don't do -- hence why states are enacting these surcharges. Georgia charges 31 cents/gallon. So 15,000 miles a year and say 20 mpg, $232.50/yr in gas taxes. Now, that does kind of amount to a penalization of EVs as most cars aren't driven 15,000 miles a year and most EVs are driven even less (more like 10,000). Plus EVs are mostly econoboxes which get more than 20 mpg.
Most of the reason EVs aren't selling though isn't that pretty darn minor penalization. It's because EVs aren't yet cost effective and have downsides (range). Subsidies helped make them cost effective but everyone knew those weren't going to be permanent.
Pretty simple folks, in 2015, we imported over 75,000,000 megawatt hours of electricity from Canada and Mexico. That's LOTS of juice. Electric cars as we have them now are just plain a stupid use of resources. Someday, maybe they might be a viable mode of transportation, but not today. Strangely though, all of the folks in the know think that diesel electric is the future. It doesn't take a huge diesel engine to turn a generator big enough to drive your car. What you will give up though is the massive horsepower and fast cars. Are you ready for that? Most aren't.
There are other modes of energy out there. Most of which are already created and sitting on the shelf waiting. NASA has microwave energy from satellites that could easily take over all of our energy needs. But you can't have it. Why? Ask any of our politicians. That's all that's standing between you and almost free energy. But the Gov't has no way as of yet to make it into the cash cow our current fossil fuels provide to the drunken sailors in DC. There's also the Dr Paul engine that makes over 900HP and consumes 25 gallons of fuel in 24 hours that's made from......your garbage. But you can't have it as Uncle Sugar would miss out on all of the tax dollars. You wonder why these states are starting to hammer the electric car? Follow the money and electric cars provides near none for the states who have to find the money to fix the streets, additional infrastructure, etc. The free ride is over.
Currently the range of an electric car limits their appeal to customers. If the charging time can get down to a matter of minutes minutes instead of hours then the range will be less of an issue. Until then, the electric car is a commuter vehicle that cost thousands more than a similar size gasoline vehicle.
In the LA area the electric company advertises to run your washer and dryer in the evening and turn the air conditioner down to save electricity. How are they going to charge up millions of cars.
I'm in MA which has a $1500 tax credit. That plus the $4500 fed tax credit really makes me want to pull the trigger on the Prius Prime plugin hybrid. I'd be pissed though if the state slaps an annual penalty on the car down the road.
The credits were set years ago. This isn't something that is just being done now. By this time next electric car sales should hit 1 million.
I love my plug in/hybrid. I don't understand why people get all bent over what other people buy.
It effects what everybody else buys, or whats available in the future, hence the rapid dissappearance of manual transmissions because of lazy people, the dissapearance of minitrucks and so fourth.
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