EV technology startup REE Automotive announced its latest milestone today, having been awarded two separate CARB certifications for its P7-C chassis cab. Now sales eligible in California, “Powered by REE” EVs are eligible for huge incentives, with other CARB-friendly states expected to follow suit.
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Seven months after kicking off production of its Class 3 electric trucks in Mississippi, EV startup Mullen Automotive has secured fruitful environmental compliance and approvals from CARB and the EPA. As a result, those CARB-compliant states and Washington DC enable tremendous savings to fleet operators who purchase electric trucks from Mullen.
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California has refreshed its “Clean Fuel Rewards” program, increasing the amount to $1,500 upfront (no application required) and simplifying availability to customers statewide. The new incentive is available for any eligible electric vehicle (including motorcycles!) purchased from a participating retailer starting today, November 17.
As this is a refresh of California’s previous Clean Fuel program, which was a collaboration between the California Air Resources Board and electric utility providers, those previous utility programs will disappear at the end of this year. But other incentives still exist, and until the end of the year, the utility incentives are still active — which means customers who buy before December 31 may be able to double-up and save an extra grand or so.
Update: SCE has reached out to clarify that their $1k rebate does not stack with the new $1,500 incentive, and other utility incentives likely don’t either. While CARB said that both incentives can be used on the same car, SCE itself doesn’t allow customers to take both incentives. So check with your individual utility to see if their programs stack.
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Automakers have sent another letter to the governments of the US and California regarding upcoming fuel economy rules, asking the EPA to stop a planned fuel economy rollback, the New York Times reports.
Currently, the EPA and DOT are finalizing a rollback of fuel economy standards, which is expected to go into place soon despite challenges by California and the 13 “CARB states” that follow California Air Resources Board rules. If implemented, the plan would likely split the US auto market and cause nightmares for automakers – at least those that sell polluting cars.
California is the biggest market for electric vehicles in the US. At a time when the electric vehicle federal tax credit is phasing out for Tesla buyers, the state is considering increasing its EV rebate to $4,500.
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In the wake of the EPA’s move last month to eliminate federal fuel efficiency standards for 2022-2025 model year cars, California has filed a lawsuit against the EPA to stop the move from happening. The lawsuit was filed today with California Governor Jerry Brown, Attorney General Xavier Becerra, and the California Air Resources Board as plaintiffs, with 17 other states joining in.
In total, the states filing the lawsuit represent 140 million Americans and about 43% of the country’s car market.
A federal court ruled today that the Department of Transportation must implement a new, inflation-adjusted fine for failure to comply with federal fuel efficiency standards.
This ruling confirms that automakers will have to pay the full, updated fine for failing to meet efficiency standards. The Department of Transportation’s attempted rule would have let them pay less than 40% of the legally required fine.
Trump’s embattled EPA head Scott Pruitt has come down on the side of polluters on just about every issue that faces the US, so it is with little surprise that in a recent interview he signaled that he may try to fight back against California’s fuel economy requirements.
The California Air Resources Board (CARB) voted unanimously to continue implementing higher emissions standards in their meeting on Friday. This sets California’s clean-air agency up for a fight against the federal Environmental Protection Agency, which recently signaled that they aren’t too interested in doing their job of actually protecting the environment.
The emissions rules require automakers to average 54.5mpg (by the less stringent CAFE standard) over all new vehicles by 2025.
California’s ZEV mandate has been quite successful in making California an important market for electric vehicles. The idea is that automakers get ZEV credits when they sell zero-emission vehicles in the state. If they sell enough ZEVs as part of their entire sales in the market, they comply with the mandate and they will not get fined, but if they don’t sell enough, they will be fined or they can purchase ZEV credits (at a discount on the fine) from other automakers with a surplus.
The California Air Resources Board (CARB) is working on updating the program and the automotive industry is on the edge of its seat to learn the impact it will have on the Californian auto market, which is the most important in the US.
Mary Nichols, the chair of the state’s Air Resources Board, hinted this week that they were leaning toward making the mandate stricter despite some strong opposition by automakers.
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California’s Air Resources Board is starting to realize that it might have made a mistake by projecting a 15.4 percent market share for zero-emission vehicles (ZEVs) by 2025. The state, which pioneered incentivizing automakers to sell electric vehicles, is being outpaced by countries, like Norway and the Netherlands, exploring the idea of ZEVs having a 100 percent market share within the same timeframe.
Furthermore, because of Tesla, which only sells ZEVs, and the popularity of a few plug-in hybrid models, like the Volt, ZEV credits have flooded the market and now automakers would only need to achieve a 6 percent ZEV market share in the state and compensate with credits bought from other automakers in order to comply with CARB’s mandate without being fined.
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The California Air Resource Board (CARB) updated its website to surprisingly add an unannounced new Tesla Model S 75D to its list of vehicles eligible for single occupant carpool lane stickers. While Tesla unveiled a new drivetrain powered by a 75 kWh battery pack for the Model X last month, the automaker didn’t want to confirm the same battery option for the Model S.
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Next week, the California Air Resources Board (ARB) will hold a public workshop on the FY 2016-17 Funding Plan for Low Carbon Transportation and Fuels Investments and AQIP. Under the current proposal, the Clean Vehicle Rebate Project (CVRP) would receive $230 million in funding through 2017.
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We knew it was coming for a while, but today the California Air Resources Board (CARB) confirmed the exact timeframe. The California Clean Vehicle Rebate (CVRP) will be increasing for low- and moderate-income drivers, while it will also introduce a cap for high-income drivers.
The change will apply statewide to vehicle purchases or leases effective March 29, 2016.
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38 company and environmental group leaders, including Tesla CEO Elon Musk, signed an open letter proposing that the California Air Resources Board (CARB) lets VW off the hook in California for having cheated on reporting emissions in its diesel cars and in return, VW would be forced to significantly invest in electric vehicles or other zero-emission vehicles.
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On Thursday, California’s Air Resources Board had a meeting and status update on the state’s ‘Zero Emission Vehicle’ (ZEV) program where industry actors expressed their views on the clean vehicle market and the ZEV credit mandate. During a presentation to the board, Tesla’s Vice President of Business Development Diarmuid O’Connell argued that lobbying efforts from automakers effectively delayed fuel economy in the U.S. by about 20 years.
He added that the automotive industry used similar lobbying tactics to delay the commercialization of Zero Emission Vehicles. He said the effort delayed the state of California’s initial 1998 goal of 2% market penetration by 16 years – Zero Emission vehicles only reached 2% of the market in 2014.
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