Author Topic: Washington state votes to ban new gas car sales by 2030  (Read 1228 times)

rcjordan

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Washington state votes to ban new gas car sales by 2030
« on: April 17, 2021, 06:45:20 PM »
California and Massachusetts orders banning gas car sales by 2035 now seem relatively cautious.

The initiative would only kick in if the state approves a tax on miles traveled to help fund transportation infrastructure.

Governor Jay Inslee has yet to sign

https://www.engadget.com/washington-state-gas-car-sales-ban-2030-175652987.html

ergophobe

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Re: Washington state votes to ban new gas car sales by 2030
« Reply #1 on: April 18, 2021, 02:13:59 AM »
>>tax on miles traveled

There has to be something, though it seems like some weight * miles formula would get you closer to the gas tax. As it stands now, the tax-free status of driving an EV amounts to yet another subsidy to the haves. Similar to the problem with net metering.

Brad

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Re: Washington state votes to ban new gas car sales by 2030
« Reply #2 on: April 18, 2021, 11:27:36 AM »
> formula

I read horsepower mentioned somewhere as part of a formula.  So something like: horsepower * weight * miles, at least for oil burners.

rcjordan

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Re: Washington state votes to ban new gas car sales by 2030
« Reply #3 on: April 18, 2021, 02:22:12 PM »
>tax on miles

Buttegieg mentioned it as 'looking like a good solution' a couple of months ago and almost immediately got his a## handed to him.  He walked it back pretty quickly.

ergophobe

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Re: Washington state votes to ban new gas car sales by 2030
« Reply #4 on: April 19, 2021, 02:02:19 AM »
>>got his a## handed to him

There's a phrase I hit upon while designing and building our house: For every solution, there's a problem.

That seems to apply here. Somehow or other we have to figure out how to pay for roads. I get that the mileage tax hits lower income people the hardest, but
 - so does the gas tax.
 - right now the EV owners, who are mostly "haves," are getting a free ride (and often other subsidies).
 - as we transition to EVs, revenue for roads will dry up even while the gas tax falls way short of paying for roads.

So what ideas do you folks have for paying for roads in a way that is reasonably equitable? Oh, and if that's too easy, bonus points if your solution doesn't also encourage sprawl.

Brad

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Re: Washington state votes to ban new gas car sales by 2030
« Reply #5 on: April 19, 2021, 01:20:56 PM »
> what ideas do you folks have for paying for roads

Depends on what you want to do: pay for roads or reduce climate change emissions?

Paying for roads:

The first thing I would do is charge semi trucks more in accordance with the damage they do to roads.  I forget what the ratio is but it's something like 1 semi does as much damage as 60 (or something) cars.  Our highways are now choked with trucks acting as just-in-time warehouses on wheels.

We need to be figuring out ways to encourage the use of rail for long distance and use trucks for that last 200 or so miles.

(Have a theory that the sales of ever larger SUV's and pickup trucks goes beyond their ability to seat big/fat/tall Americans: bigger SUV's and pickups offer the illusion of being safer when driving between canyons of bumper to bumper semi's. Plus the larger wheels deal with giant Ford Fiesta swallowing potholes better.  Bigger passenger vehicles is a defensive move.)

But I'd also figure out a way to up the tax on those bigger passenger vehicles.

> climate change emissions

If we want to encourage the switch to EV's we may have to hold off on being "fair" for a few years.  We subsidized the Internet for about 10 years to get ecommerce established.  It wasn't fair but we thought the greater good lay with getting the Internet established.  Same with EV's.  EV's seem so packed with electronics and I'm guessing in the future they will all be sending telemetry back to the manufacturer, whether we like it or not, so collecting miles driven data shouldn't be a big problem.

But, I agree with you Ergo, it's all trade-offs and no perfect solutions.

rcjordan

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Re: Washington state votes to ban new gas car sales by 2030
« Reply #6 on: April 30, 2021, 01:45:28 PM »
EV owners looking at extra costs as UK moves to plug road tax gap

https://thenextweb.com/news/mandatory-road-pricing-to-plug-uks-40bn-tax-gap-after-shift-to-evs