Clean car mandates will require that dealers sell more than 550,000 zero emission vehicles (ZEVs) in New Jersey through 2025. New car dealers want to sell every single one of those EVs, but there are obstacles to overcome if consumers are ever going to purchase these vehicles in the numbers being mandated.
Manufacturers need to equip and price EVs better, so they are on par with comparable internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles, but they have no real incentive to price EVs to sell, because New Jersey’s Clean Car only requires them to “deliver” clean cars for sale to earn their clean car credits. If manufacturers were unable to earn their credits until vehicles were “sold and placed in service” they would be forced to address EV pricing concerns.
Government also needs to put its money where its mouth is by extending the Sales Tax exemption to include a partial exemption for hybrid and other clean cars and providing cash-on-the-hood incentives to boost EV sales.
There also needs to be significant private and public investment in expanding New Jersey’s existing charging infrastructure so consumers can overcome range anxiety.
If State and federal regulators, elected officials, automakers, public utilities, environmental groups, manufacturers, and other EV stakeholders pull together to address the most pressing affordability and infrastructure challenges, New Jersey’s neighborhood new car dealers will be relentless in promoting, selling, and delivering EVs to more and more consumers.