Rant on Vehicle Licensing Surcharge for PHEV

turtleturtle

turtleturtle

Active Member
I just need to rant on this.

Many states, my own included, have moved to an annual surcharge on EVs and PHEVs due to the projected loss in tax revenue from gas.

What drives me nuts is for a PHEV, we are still using gas and it disincentivizes the cost savings. There is no way I would spend this much in gas tax. In addition, our state is covered in toll roads. What are we even paying for?

We need to move to a pay-per-mile system, but I get that’s a little Big Brother. How about just an annual odometer disclosure?

/end rant
 
Residential electric peak demand charges is the best way to tax households with EVs. Set multiple tiers for 15 minute intervals of:
  • Average kW Tier 1 1.75kWh in 15 minutes (15 minutes of 7kW continuous) - $50 per billing period
  • Average kW Tier 2 2.4kWh in 15 minutes (15 minutes of 9.6 kW continuous) - $100 per billing period
Anyone Level 2 charging above 30A will pay $50 and 40A and above will pay $100 per billing period. This will also be charged to households that use high loads (air conditioner + pool pumps + laundry dryer) simultaneously. Just tax electricity!
 
I hear you, but I don't see that changing anytime soon. The goal will be to get it into regulations while EV ownership is still a very small population and thus unlikely to mount any significant opposition
 
teslarati97 said:
Residential electric peak demand charges is the best way to tax households with EVs. Set multiple tiers for 15 minute intervals of:
  • Average kW Tier 1 1.75kWh in 15 minutes (15 minutes of 7kW continuous) - $50 per billing period
  • Average kW Tier 2 2.4kWh in 15 minutes (15 minutes of 9.6 kW continuous) - $100 per billing period
Anyone Level 2 charging above 30A will pay $50 and 40A and above will pay $100 per billing period. This will also be charged to households that use high loads (air conditioner + pool pumps + laundry dryer) simultaneously. Just tax electricity!
Click to expand...

You really thought that one through.
 
turtleturtle said:
We need to move to a pay-per-mile system, but I get that’s a little Big Brother. How about just an annual odometer disclosure?
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It is definitely an issue that needs to be addressed. Reporting mileage and calculating a fee at the time of registration would be a simple solution. It would also be difficult to avoid. So, that will never happen.

Whatever “solution” develops, just remind yourself of the $7500 Fed Credit. Here in Oregon, they sent us an additional $2500 and there’s more where that came from. That’s one reason we just ordered another PHEV.

Also keep in mind that with current fuel prices your cost per mile is likely a bit lower than anyone driving a conventional vehicle. For anyone who has some solar offset or access to “free” charging at work or elsewhere, the cost can approach zero.

Did that help?
 
Uh, no. For lack of bothering with terminology, speed of charging is entirely disparate from volume of charge used. Should people who get stuck with the slow pump get to pay less for their gas? :rolleyes:

Texas gasoline tax is $0.20 / gallon. I drive ~6000 miles per year. At ~40 MPG, assuming I was driving in hybrid mode all the time, that'd be $30. Then correct that since half of those miles aren't actually in Texas, so Texas gas taxes don't apply (but it is all HV, so the other states' gas taxes do cover that usage), and make it $15. You're arguing that I should, if driving in EV, not only be paying more than twice as much as the equivalent gas user, but also that I should have to pay even more of a penalty for charging more quickly (and efficiently; higher voltage = lower amperage = less resistance = less heat).

Price per mile, possibly weighted per your vehicle's weight, is the ONLY fair metric here.
 
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You didn't say how much the fee was. Is it less for PHEV vehicles than EVs? How much more is it than for the average Texan that drives a car/truck? I would rather have things simple and mildly unfair than more difficult to administer.
 
Mark W said:
You didn't say how much the fee was. Is it less for PHEV vehicles than EVs? How much more is it than for the average Texan that drives a car/truck? I would rather have things simple and mildly unfair than more difficult to administer.
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Sure. Context matters. It’s an additional $150, on top of regular renewal fees. Total this year was $350. WA State.

Our gas tax is about $0.50/gallon. So that $150 is 300 gallons of gas equivalent, or 12,000 miles in HV driving. I’m assuming this is how they did their math too to get the average to charge EVs.

We mostly drive local, and not nearly that amount of miles.

The plus side is electric is about 0.10/Kwh here (hydroelectric), so it’s always cheap to charge.

The government just has to get their money somehow. I get it. It still feels like a penalty.
 
Landshark said:
You really thought that one through.
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Well if I was a policymaker, that would be the most fair way to do it. Commercial utility rates have peak load demand charges so it's time to update the regulations to allow for residential peak load demand charges.

PHEV drivers will largely be unaffected as they can charge at 3.6kW (15A x 240V) but it includes extremely wasteful households running simultaneous loads. Unless you want another California pole mounted residential transformer fire (and outage), regulators need to step in to curb charging habits. If you don't want to pay the peak demand fee, charge slower or buy an EV with a smaller battery!
 
teslarati97 said:
Well if I was a policymaker, that would be the most fair way to do it. Commercial utility rates have peak load demand charges so it's time to update the regulations to allow for residential peak load demand charges.

PHEV drivers will largely be unaffected as they can charge at 3.6kW (15A x 240V) but it includes extremely wasteful households running simultaneous loads. Unless you want another California pole mounted residential transformer fire (and outage), regulators need to step in to curb charging habits. If you don't want to pay the peak demand fee, charge slower or buy an EV with a smaller battery!
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Again, no. The peak demand is being served by my solar panels. Just because Texas tracks usage and generation and demand all discretely on the stupid little "smart" meters does not mean I ever had that much demand placed on the grid. They should be *paying me* because I, with my solar panels' excess, am reducing peak demand on the grid in my neighbourhood.

I am really tired of these people trying to insist I and every other solar homeowner should be penalized for the benefits Oncor gets from us.
 
Even deep red states are getting into the action. State of Oklahoma added another $90 to my annual tag fee for 'EV surcharge'. I drive less than 5000 miles a year, $90 seems excessive... especially in a oil state that is currently rolling in the tax revenue. But like said above we don't have enough voices to change these new laws.

In retrospect, $90 isn't a big deal when my neighbors regularly dump $100 to fill up their fuel guzzling air hauler pickups.
 
FWIW: Here are the vehicle registration renewal fees in Oregon. Renewal period is 2 years. New vehicles pay double, as registration on a new vehicle is for 4 years. Rates are tiered based on fuel efficiency, where more fuel efficient vehicles pay a higher fee.

The 4 year registration fee on the Clarity at the time of purchase was $224, or $56/yr plus Title and License. Next year, the 2 year renewal will be $156, or $78/yr.

EV’s have an option to join a program which reduces the registration fee in exchange for paying 1.9 cents per mile. The break even point on that decision is about 12,000 miles. 97DCECE2-8329-4068-842F-B6D0C371110D.webp8D1D82BA-7D39-4ACF-B106-FBDC0EC5FB45.webp
 
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In Ohio it is an extra $200 a year on the registration. When that was imposed I dropped my vanity plate (shown in the user pic) to partially compensate. I’ll note without further comment that Ohio recently had a huge corruption scandal when the owners of the Perry nuclear plant were found guilty of paying state senators millions of dollars in bribes for a huge state bailout bill, that passed. And even after outrage the bill quietly was left standing and the bailout in place, no harm to the company who did the bribing at all……..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohio_nuclear_bribery_scandal
 
ralfalfa said:
I’ll note without further comment that Ohio recently had a huge corruption scandal when the owners of the Perry nuclear plant were found guilty of paying state senators millions of dollars in bribes for a huge state bailout bill, that passed. And even after outrage the bill quietly was left standing and the bailout in place, no harm to the company who did the bribing at all…….
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What about this part?

B59C61F9-8A61-46FD-ADE5-F12DB6030A1D.webp
Did anyone who took a bribe receive a pants down spanking? They’re all dirty. Just pick your favorite program, grab a shovel and find the bodies.

The bottom line is that the equivalent of a gas/diesel tax needs to be imposed on vehicles that do not use gas/diesel but do use public roadways. Every state has a different fuel tax, so we can expect to see a hodgepodge of “solutions” at the state level. Currently, in Oregon, a PHEV flies under the radar as a 40mpg+ conventional vehicle. We’ll pay $10-15/yr more than our diesel swilling Jeep and gas guzzling truck and the same as any non-plug-in hybrid or ICE that gets 40mpg+, yet we’ll pay virtually no fuel taxes to drive the car. The last purchase was 3.5 gallons about 6 months ago. I use more fuel in the lawn mower.

Will the geniuses in charge ever figure that one out? I doubt it

B59C61F9-8A61-46FD-ADE5-F12DB6030A1D.webp

The $1.3B bailout cost them $230M in fines and $60M in grease. They’re up $1B. Rinse and repeat.
 
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Alabama has $100 for PHEVs, $200 for EVs, annually. I'm not that irritated about it for the Clarity. Current gas tax here is $0.28/gal. So that is 350 gallons of gas driving that they assume I am offsetting with electricity. At 40 mpg, that is 14,000 miles per year assumed driving on electricity. I'm running more like 8k miles per year on battery, so it is maybe $40/year too high to be equitable for me. But since it is a one size fits all type of tax, I would have to say it's not completely unreasonable.
 
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