Taking a seasonal pit stop from my usual run of practical advice and policy advocacy I head off-road into something a little racier [enough of the car metaphors — ed.]
An open letter to David Booth
Postmedia’s “MotorMouth” is no foot-dragging petrol-head. But I’m er… driven to distraction by two recent columns
I recently searched — so far in vain — for analysis of the effects of the new Federal EV Mandate outside the “big three” EV provinces and Alberta’s own quite different kind of motormouth. In fact, one of the reasons I started this service is to provide guidance for consumers and policymakers that acknowledges the very different situation of those who are in the “have not” regions with just 10% of the EV market.
In the course of that search however I encountered two recent Motormouth “takes” that I had to take issue with (though as one experienced journo to another, I hope he knows it’s nothing personal!) Without further ado (and to explain my headline), #1:
An open letter to Pierre Poilievre on EVs
You can get the gist of each piece by following the links so I’ll just give my thoughts on the bits that caught my eye:
Don’t cancel — at least wholesale — the Liberals’ ZEV mandate
Ah, if only you had stopped there…
a complete repeal of EV mandates is probably politically unsellable [would help lead to] un-electability in Vancouver (where ZEV penetration is 29 per cent), Montreal (23 per cent), and Toronto (nine per cent and finally growing)
Maybe true because of crude signaling issues… but if you are in a province which already has a ZEV mandate, in reality a Federal mandate is only important if you think your province would drop yours. The missed opportunity (I argue) is that the Feds failed to put a floor mandate out covering the rest of the provinces so they can get better EV supply too.
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Why complain the average price of a BEV is a “whopping” $73,000 without mentioning the crazy average price of any new car — $63,500 according to AutoTrader or factor in the undoubted lifetime consumer benefits from much lower maintenance costs and of course hugely cheaper fuel? You’re smarter than that.
dump the federal $5,000 EV tax credit… take all the money saved and put it into EV recharging infrastructure
Yes! Effective price parity (as I note above) is already pretty close…
No checking of their self-rated fuel-economy for accuracy. No additional “factors” — like the aforementioned idle stop-start function — to calculate into an already over-complicated formula. Just count the number of cars with batteries in them.
Thus encouraging carmakers to keep producing outsized gas guzzling monster SUVs and pickups as long as they can also go 100km on electric power? Hybrids had their uses before we figured out how to make BEVs economical and effective. Don’t let Canada be a dumping ground for a soon-to-be obsolete transitional technology.
Now on to the main course…
The consequences of Canada’s EV mandate
a lot of things have to go right for Canada to achieve 100-per-cent ZEV sales nationwide by 2035.
OK let’s be serious — I think this 2035 target here in Canada and elsewhere is like everyone’s zero emissions 2050 target. Sounds good, far enough in the future that it seems vaguely plausible but nothing a current politician will have to take the blame for missing. It’s the intermediate targets that the feds can try to enforce that are the most important. The 100% has its uses though if only by signalling seriousness. If we get to 80% as a result it will have done what it was supposed to.
The federal government will have to maintain its subsidies much longer than originally proposed.
Subsidies of highway charging stations and maybe level 2s in difficult to serve areas, maybe. EV subsidies? Absolutely not —whatever the hiccups now, economies of scale, and broadening of EV offerings into the middle and low end will make direct subsidies unnecessary before too long — if governments keep the pressure on manufacturers to keep working on mass market BEVs with lower margins now, so volumes go up to enable their costs to go down.
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Your criteria for what families need in an EV is unrealistic and echoes back exactly the spurious arguments that North American manufacturers have provided for their oversized offerings.
400-km-plus-(real-)highway-range
Er… Why? As you know well, the average Canadian family drives about 15,000km a year. Nearly all of that will be sub 100km circular journeys starting and finishing at home or work where they will charge to full in time for their next trip. On the highway they will encounter fast chargers every 100km or less unless they are a long way from the core network. If they are planning an annual wilderness expedition, I imagine hybrid car rental companies will increasingly fill that role.
You must know your history and economics enough to understand that Canadians didn’t always want ever-bigger SUVs and pickups — we were sold them because they gave carmakers fatter margins and let them avoid fuel efficiency standards. Well, in France they are already taking aim at this. And if instead of pushing ever-bigger battery ranges, manufacturers eventually realize they can make a profit by selling EVs with moderate range (and a little user education to counter the misinformation they originally spread), your “where are the inexpensive EVs” argument disappears.
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It’s true that there’s a real danger to European and North American carmakers that Chinese ones will eat their lunch by both designing more suitable cars and using China’s present supply chain advantages to out-compete them. But for sound reasons policymakers everywhere outside China are busy trying to tackle all aspects of the supply chain, and here in Canada we have a decent shot at making that work in our favour. If our carmakers stopped ducking and weaving and started seriously trying to make and sell a broad range of EVs at volume while educating consumers about their practical benefits and un-teaching the bogus range anxiety they have been spreading, then they looked for help when unsuccessful, I would be more sympathetic.
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It’s also true that a crude numerical EV target as currently outlined…
will concentrate automakers’ efforts on big-ticket vehicles even more, which these days means truck and SUVs
But they hardly need encouragement to do that as it is. The EV mandate doesn’t need to be the only tool in regulators’ toolbox.
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It is your conclusion to this article that really inspired this whole rant in the first place.
Other provinces — with a less compliant consumer and/or no provincial incentives for EV purchase — are selling far fewer
I live in one of those “other provinces” — Newfoundland and Labrador. Sure there’s a fair amount of EV skepticism here, born largely of a lack of actual exposure to EVs. I’d argue that our problem with EV adoption isn’t mainly this or a lack of infrastructure, though (here in Newfoundland anyhow). We even have a pretty good provincial purchase incentive. But we also have a small market and dealers who have been comfortably selling big-margin pickups to us, with little interest (financial or otherwise) in learning about EVs themselves or in educating the driving public here on how an EV would work just fine for them. As a result, if you want an EV here you have to try pretty hard.
There’s no Tesla office in Newfoundland and Labrador at all, and as for promised cars from smaller brands like the Fiat 500e I would love to test … well, I would probably need to drive to Quebec to see one.
What if Quebec and British Columbia and, indeed, most of the other provinces hit the 100-per-cent ZEV target on time, but Alberta, Saskatchewan, or Manitoba — or even all three — only get to, say, 50 per cent?
Unfortunately — at least in the short term — car makers can easily hit their quotas by trying a little harder in Quebec, BC and Ontario and continuing to largely ignore the rest of the country where they would need to make an effort and maybe irritate a few dealers.
Perhaps as we approach 2035 the 100% target will seem too demanding but in the meantime the rest of us outside Quebec, BC and Ontario will have to press our Premiers to introduce provincial quotas as well if we want manufacturers and dealers to offer and support a decent range of EVs here.
Seriously, drop me a line and/or come out to the Atlantic provinces and see for yourself how different our situation is. The way Canadian EV adoption tends to be covered by the national press just doesn’t quite fit our circumstances. We don’t have idiot premiers talking down EVs. And in some ways I have argued Newfoundland and Labrador should have a booming EV market instead of one of Canada’s smallest. But we do (still!) have a supply crisis — exactly the kind that an EV mandate might have helped. Hope we get one here soon…
Don’t know if you’re still reading this, David, but if you are, another David thanks you.
If you aren’t David, I am not sure why you are still reading but I hope you learned something along the way. Or enjoyed the ride anyhow.
Seasons Greetings to all!
