This letter pertains to the mandate to boost EV sales the Board of Environmental Protection voted against recently which would have required the sale of all electric vehicles (EV) and plug in hybrids (PHEV) to be 51% of all vehicles sold in Maine by 2028 and 82% of all vehicles by 2032.
There appeared to be a lot of opposition to this proposal, due to the higher cost of these vehicles compared to all gas vehicles, range anxiety, and an overreach of state regulation.
We own two PHEVs. When driving in EV mode, there is noticeably more power than the gas mode. They are fun to drive! PHEVs cost on average around 5K more than gas vehicles and EVs are around 7K more. PHEVs also run on gas so there is no danger of running out of power.
What if the cost of an EV or PHEV was the same as a gas vehicle? Federal tax credits are a good way to accomplish this, but the current ones are declining or have been eliminated. The Inflation Reduction Act recently let politics dictate this by requiring that the final assembly of the vehicle to be in North America. This mandate should be done at the federal level with tax credits free of politics to offset the additional cost of the vehicles. I think then, the demand for these vehicles would increase on their own merit.
Paul Mitnik
Vassalboro
Send questions/comments to the editors.
Success. Please wait for the page to reload. If the page does not reload within 5 seconds, please refresh the page.
Enter your email and password to access comments.
Hi, to comment on stories you must . This profile is in addition to your subscription and website login.
Already have a commenting profile? .
Invalid username/password.
Please check your email to confirm and complete your registration.
Only subscribers are eligible to post comments. Please subscribe or login first for digital access. Here’s why.
Use the form below to reset your password. When you've submitted your account email, we will send an email with a reset code.