Calls increase for EV incentives

A feebate to support electric vehicle uptake and a halt to importing fossil fuel cars from 2030 are sought by the Wellington City Council.

These are among proposed measures in a draft plan seeking public input by 5pm on May 10 on how Wellington can reach a zero-carbon future by 2050.

In a message to central government, no feebate and no restriction on fossil fuel vehicle imports could make it difficult for Wellington to achieve its goal, the report Te Atakura – First to Zero, Wellington’s blueprint for a Zero Carbon Capital indicates.

Calls for central government to get cracking on a feebate scheme, which encourages EV uptake and penalises polluting vehicles, have come from other organisations such as Drive Electric.

Its chairman Mark Gilbert told Stuff the previous government’s 64,000 EV target by 2021 is “dead” and an apparent lack of government progress on EV incentives is “disappointing”.

Drive Electric and other EV advocates expected to hear something around encouraging EV uptake from the government by now, or in the May 30 budget at latest.

“Everything’s gone quiet – it’s gone into a big Bermuda Triangle,” Gilbert tells EVtalk. “We don’t know what’s going on and this was supposed to be the year of delivery.”

Both associate transport minister Julie Anne Genter and climate change minister James Shaw have previously suggested new incentives are on the way (EVtalk, February 2019), the Productivity Commission recommending last year that the government take steps to boost EVs and reduce transport emissions.

But a spokesperson for Genter’s office says the minister now expects options to go to Cabinet in the first half of this year, Stuff reports.

Genter told television Three’s Nation on April 27 that before new targets are announced the government needs to ensure it has the policies to make it more affordable for and to give New Zealanders greater choice around cleaner cars.

EVtalk’s attempts to learn more from both ministers drew no further comment.

Visit www.zerocarboncapital.nz/

for more information on Wellington’s report.