United States: California Governor Gavin Newsom will reintroduce a state plan called the Clean Vehicle Rebate Project if the newly-elected President, Donald Trump, cancels the federal tax credit incentive to electric car buyers, his office stated on Monday.
The Trump administration, in its transition team, has proposed the complete phasing out of the federal tax credit of $7,500 for EVs, which was earlier published in Reuters this month under the tax reform legislation.
California’s EV Leadership
California has sold over two hundred thousand zero-emissions vehicles, twofold from the previous year.
The CVRP, through which the state of California had given up to $7,500 incentive for the purchase or leasing of new plug-in hybrid, battery electric, or fuel cell EV, was discontinued about a year ago.
The proposed rebates could be sourced from the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, which has a pool of funds contributed by polluters, according to the Governor’s office.
It stated the CVRP funded over 594,000 vehicle purchases throughout the lifetime of the program. California has the highest sales of electric vehicles in the United States.
Ambitious Goals
Earlier in March, a California official said that he was confident the Environmental Protection Agency would green-light a plan to phase out the sale of new gasoline-only cars by 2035, a move that has been assailed by major automakers, as reported by Reuters.
The rules in California, which have been emulated by the twelve other states, prescribe that come 2035, 80% of all new vehicles sold in the state must be electric and not more than 20% plug-in hybrid electric.