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Transportation United States

Chuck Schumer Proposes 'Large Discounts' To Trade in Gas-Powered Cars For Electric Ones (theverge.com) 262

Posted by msmash from the moving-forward dept.
US Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) proposed a plan that would provide car owners with "large discounts" if they trade in their polluting, gas-powered vehicles for "clean" electric ones. From a report: In an op-ed published in The New York Times, Schumer said the goal of his "cash-for-clunkers"-style plan is to ensure that every vehicle on the road is zero-emission by 2040. Schumer didn't reveal the exact amount of each per-person discount -- the legislation has yet to be written -- though he did note that lower-income Americans should get "an even bigger discount on a new vehicle or a discount on a used electric vehicle." Schumer estimates that his proposal would result in 63 million fewer gas-powered cars on the road by 2030. There are two other prongs to Schumer's Green New Deal-style plan: grants to states and cities to build out a robust EV charging network, and grants to businesses to retool manufacturing facilities to support the production of EVs and batteries. Schumer would deploy $45 billion in grants to upgrade the nation's charging infrastructure and $17 billion to encourage manufacturers to retrofit their facilities for EV production. Schumer estimates the entire proposal would cost $454 billion over 10 years.
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Chuck Schumer Proposes 'Large Discounts' To Trade in Gas-Powered Cars For Electric Ones More

Chuck Schumer Proposes 'Large Discounts' To Trade in Gas-Powered Cars For Electric Ones

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  • Small scale first? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Rick Schwuleman ( 6339650 ) on Friday October 25, 2019 @03:23PM (#59347842)
    Why doesn't the state of NY try this first as an experiment?

    • Re:Small scale first? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ShanghaiBill ( 739463 ) on Friday October 25, 2019 @03:32PM (#59347878)

      Why doesn't the state of NY try this first as an experiment?

      Because it is a fundamentally dumb idea.

      Subsidies rarely make sense. When they do, it is because they kickstart technology. So early subsidies for solar, wind, or even EVs could be justified.

      But electric vehicles are now a multi-billion dollar industry. What they need to do now is BRING THE PRICES DOWN, and subsidies give them the exact opposite incentive.

      • Compared to over 100 years of improvements to mass market ICE car tech, EV tech is relatively new and unimproved. Subsidies encourage investment in the tech, and the subsequent improvements bring down prices.

        • Re:Small scale first? (Score:4, Insightful)

          by ShanghaiBill ( 739463 ) on Friday October 25, 2019 @04:05PM (#59348058)

          Subsidies encourage investment in the tech

          It is already obvious that there is a huge market for EVs. We don't need subsidies to establish that.

          If we want to encourage R&D in better battery tech, then we should offer direct tax incentives for R&D, rather than broad subsidies in the hope that a few crumbs will go to R&D.

          • It is already obvious that there is a huge market for EVs/

            If there were that kind of demand in the US, we'd see them flying off the lots.

            The truth is, the US general public really isn't interested in EVs yet.

            They'd rather keep their SUVs and pickup trucks...as that that is primarily the only vehicles I see in any city I live or drive in.

      • In fact, that is why we are better off dropping subsidies on EVs, and instead, slowly increase diesel/gas tax by .01/gal / month. THis will make the used EVs more valuable and keep them on the market longer while sending clunkers to the graveyard.

        • slowly increase diesel/gas tax by .01/gal / month.

          Economically sensible.
          Politically impossible.

        • and instead, slowly increase diesel/gas tax by .01/gal / month

          Because not everyone has money to buy a new car.

          • and instead, slowly increase diesel/gas tax by .01/gal / month

            Because not everyone has money to buy a new car.

            And those who do tend to be wealthier. This whole scheme is a way to get government money into the hands of the upper middle class who buy electric cars.

            1. Directly - as a subsidy for the buying of a car
            2. Less directly - to large political donors who will be the ones to get the contracts to build out the charging infrastructure.

            This is what cronyism looks like.

            • This whole scheme is a way to get government money into the hands of the upper middle class who buy electric cars.

              Yep. But it's also far less harmful to those not in that demographic than raising the gas tax.

              • Actually raising fuel tax slowly and having it go into infrastructure is not only not damaging but will actually help the economy.

              • How about we just leave the car industry to do it’s thing?

                If we’re hell-bent on using tax money to reduce carbon emissions, give away photovoltaic installations to poor homeowners. They’ll be able to use the money they’re saving on their power bill to contribute back to the economy, and maybe even buy a newer less polluting car!

                Of course it doesn’t work politically either, because all the folks who aren’t poor will complain how it’s unfair that all their tax money

          • You do realize that gas/diesel float more than $1 each year? Raising fuel tax by .12 /gal each year for say 4-8 years will not even be noticed.
      • he got a bunch of donations from car companies and this will put money in their pockets.

        Schumer is a corrupt "Third Way" Democrat. Sooner somebody primaries his ass the better.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AHuxley ( 892839 )
      Someone has to "pay" for that cost of power.
      Who is granting what money to make something cost less?
      That "free" has to be taken from "something" to support then provided lower costs.
      A tax?
      More tax?
      The loss of services in anther sector.
      To make electric vehicle use feel better. Until the nice gov support stops and full costs return..
      Want charging infrastructure? Pay for it. Why should the US gov get to "find" extra billions over 10 years?

  • $454 billion? Way low... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by LynnwoodRooster ( 966895 ) on Friday October 25, 2019 @03:25PM (#59347844) Journal
    There are approximately 273 million vehicles registered in the US [statista.com]. Assuming "just" a $5000 credit to trade one in on a new EV, that would be over $1.36 trillion right there. Total cost, with infrastructure, would probably be closer to $2 trillion. And that's assuming that a $5000 credit is enough of an incentive to get someone to trade in a car on a brand-new $30,000+ EV...
    • From your source:

      Vehicles: passenger cars, motorcycles, other 2-axle 4-tire vehicles, single-unit 2-axle 6-tire ore more trucks, combination trucks, buses.

      So these aren't just consumer vehicles (sedans, vans, pickups, SUVs, etc), they are also commercial vehicles and pretty much anything that goes on the road. We'd need to know what fraction of all the registered vehicles on the road are consumer vehicles as this discount likely won't apply to commercial vehicles or government entities. If we divide the number by 4 we're probably closer to the tally of privately owned vehicles.

      • Re:$454 billion? Way low... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by LynnwoodRooster ( 966895 ) on Friday October 25, 2019 @03:38PM (#59347914) Journal

        From TFS:

        Schumer said the goal of his "cash-for-clunkers"-style plan is to ensure that every vehicle on the road is zero-emission by 2040

        That wouldn't be just passenger, privately owned cars. That would be every vehicle on the road, so it would include buses, trucks, motorcycles, and commercial vehicles. All 273 million of them.

        As far as divide by 4, there are 111 million registered passenger cars [statista.com] in the US. That does NOT include trucks or SUVs. Just cars. With 65% of sales going to trucks and SUVs [cnbc.com], we can reasonably estimate another 80+ million trucks and SUVs on the road, too... So even in Schumer meant just privately owned passenger vehicles, we're still looking at 200 million units - or a cost of at least $1 trillion for the subsidy alone it's just a $5,000 credit per vehicle.

        • Schumer said the goal of his "cash-for-clunkers"-style plan is to ensure that every vehicle on the road is zero-emission by 2040

          That wouldn't be just passenger, privately owned cars. That would be every vehicle on the road, so it would include buses, trucks, motorcycles, and commercial vehicles. All 273 million of them.

          For one, we don't have electric replacements available for every vehicle on the road right now. I know that, you know that, Schumer knows that as well. It's unlikely we could replace every semi, bus, pickup, and fleet vehicle with an electric replacement by 2040 even if we wanted to. There are other ways to achieve "zero-emission" that could be used here to reach that goal.

          As far as divide by 4, there are 111 million registered passenger cars in the US. That does NOT include trucks or SUVs. Just cars.

          Except it says nothing about how many of those are privately owned. Does this proposal include fleet vehicles or taxis? Cash for

          • So Schumer was making claims he knows can't be met - and based upon his cost estimates, it's going to be about $1400 per vehicle in credits ($454 billion - $63 billion = $391 billion, divided by 273 million vehicles is $1400 per vehicle). Yeah - how many people are going to trade in their cars and buy a brand new $30K+ vehicle because they get a $1400 credit?

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by guruevi ( 827432 )

            Most "commercial" vehicles are privately owned. Fleet and taxi vehicles make up a rounding error in all these proposals. We're talking about $500B-6T, which is expensive. And you'll have to do that every ~5 years until EV's reach ICE price parity (~20 years from now).

            And even then you're reducing US emissions by 20% or global emissions by something like 2% IF you can power everything from clean nuclear power.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by guruevi ( 827432 )

        113M private vehicles and ~8M motorcycles.

        Not quite division by 4. The last time we gave cash for clunkers, everyone ended up using the money to buy Hummers and SUV's.

        As was pointed out, $5k isn't quite enough to offset the cost of an EV (even when calculating TCO). A 'comparable' EV to the $15k vehicle (1 yo CPO) I currently have is $50k, my wife's $17k vehicle (3yo CPO) costs $80k in a hybrid plug-in format and doesn't exist in all-electric format. So the incentive for most people right now would always h

    • So, about four years worth of US gasoline consumption? Is that a lot or not?

    • The idea is a subsidy to accelerate development and adoption. Not to give money for every single car to be changed to an EV.

      'Cause there's going to be people who will not be able to afford to buy an EV even with a subsidy.

    • And that's assuming that a $5000 credit is enough of an incentive to get someone to trade in a car on a brand-new $30,000+ EV...

      Well, the good thing is that if it's not enough of an incentive, this program will cost a lot less.

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday October 25, 2019 @03:31PM (#59347874)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • What about solar powered charging stations, e.g.: https://electrek.co/2019/07/18/tesla-v3-supercharger-station-las-vegas-solar-power-battery/

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mccalli ( 323026 )
      The maths has already been done [withouthotair.com]. Just over a decade ago. It came out in favour of electric cars.
    • Multiple studies have been done over and over on this. We have the grid and power plants to handle 100% of our transportation. That assumes that less than 25% are charged in the daytime. In addition, the studies have shown that if less than 15% in the daytime, utilities will be able to actually save loads of money (ideally, leading to lower charges, but I doubt it).

      The one issue with these, is that these were done 10 years ago. All of the killing of Nuke power plants will mean more coal and nat gas. Thi

      • The one issue with these, is that these were done 10 years ago. All of the killing of Nuke power plants will mean more coal and nat gas. This will likely increase CO2 UNLESS we start building new nuclear, geothermal, and hydro power plants.

        Even using coal you get lower CO2 emissions, because of the massively increased efficiency. Around 3.5% transmission loss, which is about the same as pipelines [bts.gov] at 3.4%, no trucking loss (which is only 0.6%, but still relevant), and 95% efficiency of the electric motor, vs. 21% efficiency of the average modern engine, less driveline loss... And it's not like making gasoline is free either — most of the energy comes from burning fuel for heat which releases CO2, but around 15% of the energy going into a

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by dgatwood ( 11270 )

          Even using coal you get lower CO2 emissions, because of the massively increased efficiency. Around 3.5% transmission loss, which is about the same as pipelines at 3.4%, no trucking loss (which is only 0.6%, but still relevant), and 95% efficiency of the electric motor, vs. 21% efficiency of the average modern engine, less driveline loss... And it's not like making gasoline is free either â" most of the energy comes from burning fuel for heat which releases CO2, but around 15% of the energy going into a

        • Wrong. Even Tesla says that if we switch to 100% EVs, while all of the extra electricity will come from coal, then C02 will increase. we would have the same issue as China who continues to ADD ( not just replace) coal plants. The only way to be more efficient than gas/diesel ICE would be using at worse ground based or bio-based methane( iow, methane derived from coal would be disaster, unless the coal->methane derived CO2 was buried ).

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by hey! ( 33014 )

      Sure, if you tried to replace every gasoline vehicle on the market overnight, but you have to put this in the context of a market where consumers already spend on the order of $450 billion/year on vehicle purchases. As eye-poppingly expensive as a program like this is, it's only going to affect the *marginal rate of adoption*.

      In the long term -- not even the long term, in the *mid*-term, if we want to get serious about climate change, we need a more sophisticated electricity grid.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by DogDude ( 805747 )
      Someone do the math on the electrical infrastructure required to power an equal amount of electric cars and drive an equal amount of miles. On a small scale, all of this looks great. In Real Life none of this flies.

      How does the infrastructure support moving around vast amount of extremely flammable, toxic liquids today?

  • Great! (Score:5, Funny)

    by PPH ( 736903 ) on Friday October 25, 2019 @03:36PM (#59347902)

    I'll show Chuck where he can drop off my new Taycan. You can haul off that $300 shitbox that I've had up on blocks in anticipation of another government deal.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mccalli ( 323026 )
      Although I get the point, there's a lot more than Taycans and Teslas out there. There's the Nissan Leaf for instance, which has been around long enough to have passably low second hand prices. There's the BMW i3 - a bit flawed perhaps, but the older ones are relatively cheap second hand as well.

      When you factor in the running costs, they're often cheaper than petrols. You're correct to say there's no real bargain basement ones yet, but it's only a matter of time and depreciation.

      • Although I get the point, there's a lot more than Taycans and Teslas out there. There's the Nissan Leaf for instance, which has been around long enough to have passably low second hand prices. There's the BMW i3 - a bit flawed perhaps, but the older ones are relatively cheap second hand as well.

        When you factor in the running costs, they're often cheaper than petrols. You're correct to say there's no real bargain basement ones yet, but it's only a matter of time and depreciation.

        Call me when they have a

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by PPH ( 736903 )

        There's the Nissan Leaf for instance [kym-cdn.com]

        The Leaf is just the first step down the slippery slope of telling people "Since you've given up all the amenities and conveniences, you might as well just take a bus."

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • the way this works is you take your aging Honda that you bought as the spare for your wife and that's only really worth about $6k and trade it in for $8k in subsidies.

      Then the Honda's engine gets filled with sand and ran for a few minutes and there's two big wins:

      1. The Car industry just took a perfectly good used car off the road that would have competed with the purchase of a new one, driving up both the cost of new cars _and_ the value of any used inventory they have lying around.

      2. A nice new

  • No need for this. (Score:4)

    by 140Mandak262Jamuna ( 970587 ) on Friday October 25, 2019 @03:36PM (#59347904) Journal
    Government should not pick winners and losers. Simply get out of the way. Nothing special needed.

    Just remove obstacles to EV sales. 25 states have so many blocks for Tesla. Make it possible for it to sell its cars in USA as easily as it can sell in China or Europe. Its a disgrace we are treating an American car company like this.

    Stop states from imposing egregious fees on electric cars. States should replace the gasoline taxes by road tax based on miles reported annually during registration. Revenue neutral, same amount of taxes, whether you drive gas or electric

    Often, when government comes bearing gifts, its the grifters and well connected cronys who get the money. Show absolutely no mercy to oil companies, gasoline car makers. They fight in the marketplace or they die.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Dunbal ( 464142 ) *

      tax based on miles reported annually

      This already exists in the form of a tax on fuel. You want to tax people again because they live out in the countryside or have to drive a lot in the course of their work? This won't have the effect that you think it will.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by redback ( 15527 )

        they want to ditch the fuel taxes to tax all vehicles equally.

      • I'm not arguing the merits of the plan the parent posted, but they did specifically state "replace the gasoline taxes" so it wouldn't be a double tax. Additionally, it would be no harder on people who live out in the countryside than the current gasoline taxes are.

        • I'm not arguing the merits of the plan the parent posted, but they did specifically state "replace the gasoline taxes"

          When a politician says "replace an old tax with a new one", what he intends is "add a new tax in addition to the old tax"....

      • I believe the idea would be to remove to fuel tax and tax all vehicles on how far they drive.

        Right now, fuel tax works nicely as a usage tax. If you drive a lot, you probably buy a lot of gasoline. So you pay more in taxes than if you don't drive very often or very far. The problem being, what do you do about vehicles that don't burn fuel?

        So, when you register your car, someone has to check the odometer from what you reported last year and your registration cost will go up accordingly.

    • keeping the game fair. Right now the home team (gas powered) has a major advantage. We heavily subsidize the cost of gas in a hundred ways you don't think of. There's the military for one. Then there's the cost of air pollution. Not the "Save the Whales" cost but the "documented increases in cardiovascular disease and asthma" cost (and you'd think the Nerds of /. would especially care about the latter).

      Now, this plan isn't just bad, it's loathsome. Clunkers are _never_ traded in for these plans. People

  • Time to replace the gas belching Chuck Schumer with a sleek, electric powered model. Perhaps my smart toaster can be a better representative than that bloated gas bag.

  • EV has won the battle. But that news has not reached the public. The losers are prepping the government and laying the ground work for an enormous bailout.

    Osbourne Effect [wikipedia.org] is taking place right now. In the premium segments Tesla effect is. devastating the resale value of premium luxury cars burning gas [capitalone.com]

    When in doubt people simply postpone the decision. Gas car sales will plunge long before the EV car sales rise to compensate.

    The C suite of car companies know the numbers, they see the order pipe lin

    • EV has won the battle.

      Which, presumably, is why the government thinks it needs to bribe people to buy them?

      EV will have won the battle when prices (sans subsidies) are comparable to gasoline cars. And when performance is about the same as well (for which read: comparable range on a charge as a standard car gets on a tank of gas (which, for my current vehicle is 400 miles (250km for you SI junkies) - it has a small tank)..

      Will EV win out in the end? Yes, if we decide to build the power plants to charge

      • Did you mean 400km/250 miles? That's Miata-level range, and many affordable EVs get close already (Bolt is 238, VW id3 is similar). They're more expensive to buy but EVs are probably already cheaper in TCO terms. Acceleration is usually better than a comparable econobox, top speed might be lower but that's hardly important for the normal people.

        The power generation is significantly underutilized at night already, so it could handle many if not all cars. Really the only issue are charger infrastructure (a pa

    • The more likely scenario is that Tesla is working behind the scenes to get another EV government grant program going to subsidize the company. If EV won they wouldn't need incentives, duh.

      Luxury cars lose resale value quickly because they are usually less reliable than the common car. Plus repairs are insanely expensive.

  • Comment removed (Score:3)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday October 25, 2019 @04:02PM (#59348028)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Cash for Clunkers was a bad idea in terms of the problem it was advertised as solving, but in reality that's not why it existed: it was part of a general stimulus plan and was intended to help car manufacturers.

      It only slightly moved the needle on emissions, but it provably did get a bunch of polluting old shitpiles off the road. The majority of the vehicles traded in were old F-Series.

    • Converted vehicles are not anywhere near as effective as purpose-designed ones.

      Plus one goal of this is to get car makers to do more R&D on making EVs and making EVs better. That doesn't work when you're converting old cars.

  • Oh well, I'll probably be very dead by 2040
  • Match that, Chuck.
  • This shows how clueless politicians really are. Can't anything such as this naturally die off, because, you know, the new thing is actually better? Do we have to sink ourselves deeper in debt just to make ourselves feel good even though the improvement is dubious? "Forcing" almost never works because humans are too small-minded to predict "everything". (For example, I'd bet that MOST cars are not stored in a garage--how do you charge them on the street?)

    If I recall, the "cash for clunkers" (ten-year-

    • Can't anything such as this naturally die off, because, you know, the new thing is actually better?

      The market has not priced in significant externalities. Like climate change, wars in the middle east, subsidies to oil companies, and so on. As a result, the "natural" die off is too slow.

      For example, we spent about $3T after 9/11 on wars in the middle east so that we could secure oil. None of that is factored in to your gas car's price or operating costs.

      "Forcing" almost never works because humans are too small-minded to predict "everything"

      Good news! When you offer a subsidy, you don't particularly harm the people who don't take you up on that subsidy. So they aren't forced.

      If you do so

  • That ever-full piggy bank we call "the taxpayers"!

    So you're basically stealing money out of people's pockets to bribe them into trashing perfectly serviceable cars for new ones aren't actually more carbon neutral.

  • Which was just stupid if the actual point was to take gas guzzlers off the road, BTW I still drive it. Now looking at a hybrid, but if I were to wait and this bill goes through it will probably be another 'your car is too old' situation for me, or some silly tax break (doesn't help if you have no income) instead of an actual discount.
  • just give every individual $ 125,000 to get an electric because it's free. They can check the I am getting an electric car box on their tax forms. And just keep doing this every year until no one checks that box on their taxes. At that point we will be all electric and will have stopped climate change.
    Then we just use the climate change money to pay the debt of the move to electric 5 year plan ;)

    OK not a real plan! but neither is Senator Schumer's

    Just my 2 cents ;)
  • Chuck wants HIS air cleaner, who cares about where the power plant is at. Or does he just think that power coming out of the wall is clean magic? Put some windmills on top of NYC buildings or off the NY coast, THEN push for electric cars. Until then they are still Coal powered. More Nukes, Less Kooks!
  • The other problem is: Most road repairs are paid for with Gas Taxes. The gas users are the same as the road users. When you go electric, you need a different way to pay for the road repairs. Add in more tax collectors etc. Even if you don't go anywhere, your electricity taxes will go up.
  • Clunkers were never traded in, because the kind of person who owns a clunker (me) can't afford a nice new electric car no matter what discounts you give.

    Meanwhile thousands of good used cars are destroyed, because if you don't destroy those dirty polluting clunkers what's the point?

    So now there's a shortage of affordable cars in a country where if you don't have a car you don't have a job. People borrow more than they can afford to buy a car (because the alternative is unemployment) and before you k

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