New Jersey Electric Vehicle Tax

[RobertC]

Our senator in the state legislature in New Jersey, Jim Whelan, has proposed an extra tax for electric vehicles:
http://m.pressofatlanticcity.com/ne...4e0-8b80-11e2-b04c-0019bb2963f4.html?mode=jqm
and
http://www.nbc40.net/story/21595171/senator-whelan-concerned-about-zero-emission-drivers
Washington State already has this tax and Oregon is considering it.
My email to my representative is listed below. Is my math correct?

Jim,
Please reconsider.
Your facts are wrong.
There are presently 42 registered electric vehicles in New Jersey. That works out to 0.00064%, not "a little less than 2%" as you have stated. The Transportation Trust Fund will lose $4,284 of its $750 million this year. How much will it cost New Jersey taxpayers just to pass this bill for a new tax and collect the $4,284? I'm guessing a lot more than $4,284. Also, New Jersey has one of the highest electricity rates in the country thanks in part to the 15% state tax built into our electric bills. Other states offer reduced electric rates for owners of electric vehicles because they mostly charge at night when it’s cheaper to generate and deliver electricity. New Jersey also has one of the highest cancer rates in the nation. How much is it costing New Jersey taxpayers breathing in gasoline fumes and exhaust fumes that are known carcinogens?
Your math is wrong.
Electric vehicles get an equivalent of 100 miles per gallon of gas. 12,200 miles divided by 100 miles per gallon is 122 gallons of gas. At 10.5 cents a gallon the tax should be $12.81, not $102. At your tax rate, these subcompact electric vehicles are using an equivalent of 971 gallons of gas! That's 12.6 miles per gallon! Little electric vehicles don't wreck the roads like gas guzzling Humvees! Why do you want to unfairly punish owners of electric vehicles? This unfair new tax will cost New Jersey far more than it generates. This tax hurts our environment and the health of the people of New Jersey. This tax helps keep New Jersey and our nation dependent on foreign oil.
Thank you for your consideration.
Bob Corson

 

[jennrod12]

Nice letter!

Jenn

 

[jaraczs]

Bob,
I am shocked that NJ is preparing for this. Only bad words come into my mind. I am also in NJ.

I understand that you have written the letter in anger just like I feel right now. From my first glance on the issue, my understanding is that this senator does not have much support for this proposal. In any case, I think we need to write the letter in more positive way. We need to stress the alignment with the federal policy that supports EVs.

I have no idea about number of EVs in NJ but in my town, we are 3 with EVs, each of them is a different brand. Thus, I cannot verify the number of EVs in NJ. The proposed EV tax rate of $0.008 per mile makes $96 per year for 12,000 miles. Given the population in NJ, the Transportation Trust Fund (TTF) budget of $750MM breaks into $84.6 per year per head, which includes infants. The TTF is funded via tax on gas, which of course includes businesses (e.g. big trucks) so, this simplistic calculation is overblown. In addition, many drivers from out-of-state (including trucks) purchase fuel in NJ whenever possible because it is cheaper here - this is a surplus for TTF. Actually, even EV drivers are indirectly contributing into the TTF because we buy merchandise that is being transported by gas (or diesel) trucks so, $96 per EV per year is nothing but revenge of gas lover on EV lovers.
Regarding the argument that EV driver's don't contribute to the TTF, which sounds as a fair statement, I would stress that, as a consequence of EV charging, the state will collect more tax on electricity and this surplus tax should be routed to TTF. So, TTF should be collecting the fee from the state.
According to online resources, NJ state collects $0.145 gas tax and $0.041 special tax per gallon. If you buy hybrid car that gets you 40 MPG, this totals to $55.8 per year for 12,000 miles. If you are correct about 15% tax on electricity, than EV with efficiency of 4 miles/kWh and utility rate of $0.17 per kWh (what I pay), then the state tax totals to $76.5. So, we already pay more!!!

You are right that electricity is more expensive here in NJ while gasoline is one of the cheapest in the nation.

I would drop the argument of vehicle size as Tesla makes heavy EV's and Volt is heavy, too.

So, in the end, we don't have to yell at him, we outsmart him by providing better arguments.
Let me know what you think. We have to take an action.

 

[Kuuuurija]

I think, that destructive impact of the car to the roads depends more on torque and mass of the car than the amount of gasoline consumed for certain distance.
Electric vehicles have relatively high mass and torque compared to ICE vehicles of the similar size. Therefore the tax rate should rather be equal to the ICE vehicles of similar engine torque.

 

[RobertC]

The following is a copy of an email that I sent to my New Jersey representatives:

The state of New Jersey collects more state tax from an electric vehicle than it does a gas vehicle.
Using state Senator Jim Whelan's example, a fuel efficient gas vehicle getting 30 miles per gallon and traveling 12,200 miles a year would pay a state tax of $42.70 a year at the current gas tax rate of 10.5 cents a gallon. The owner of an electric vehicle would not buy gas, but would have a higher electric bill. An electric vehicle getting 3 miles per kilowatt-hour traveling 12,200 miles a year would pay an additional state tax of $97.60 a year at the current electricity rate of 16 cents a kilowatt-hour and the 15% tax the state collects on electric bills.
Since state Senator Jim Whelan is being open minded and willing to listen to suggestions, a simple change in accounting can direct the additional tax revenue that the state gets from electric vehicles into the Transportation Trust Fund. Eventually, the Transportation Trust Fund will grow as more electric vehicles are on the road.

Bob Corson

 

[Vike]

I've been holding my tongue on all this (other side of the country and all), but I think any attempt at a reasonable discussion of this proposal rather misses the point. It isn't just flawed, it's utterly unreasonable to its core.

Approximately zero percent of the U.S. passenger car fleet is made up of electric cars, having a net road damage impact that's also zero. Piddling around with torques and weights is a fool's errand. We are still at the stage of subsidizing EVs, the least of which is letting them skip road taxes on the gasoline they're not buying. When there are enough EVs to actually have an impact on our roads, then yes, EVs will be so successful that such subsidies would no longer make sense, and road use taxes could be based on something other than fuel consumption. But from where we stand today, that is a hypothetical future at best.

Proposing a special tax on this near-nonexistent vehicle category can have no possible motivation aside from a desire to strangle the infant EV market in the crib. Given that, there's no reason to consider this legislation as anything but the obvious anti-EV *********gery that it is. There is no positive way to engage with its supporters, as they are not operating with any goodwill or integrity whatever. The only alternative is that they are unaddressably stupid, which I suppose makes interaction just as futile.

 

[jaraczs]

I think Vike has taken it the right way. NJ has waived sales tax on EVs and people are still hesitating to buy one. What kind of inconsistency would it be to implement road tax on EVs?

The TTF collects money based on gas comsumption, which fluctuates based on state of economy, how much people and businesses drive and what type of (gas) vehicles are on roads. Efficient hybrid cars clearly use less gas, which most likely contributes to the underfunding. Taxing EV's would not even solve TTF problem. I think that as an immediate solution, they should increase gas tax a little to compensate for it. After all, gasoline is dirt cheap in NJ.

 

[jaraczs]

My opened e-mail to senator Jim Whelan is available on his facebook page:
http://www.facebook.com/notes/senator-jim-whelan/whelan-statement-on-green-vehicle-miles-travelled-fee-legislation/534934203213696

 

[benswing]

I'm in Montclair and agree that this is a ridiculous tax at this point. Does the state publicly list how many EV's there are somewhere on the internet? It would be interesting to see. I'm part of a group of EV drivers that gets together and goes to events to promote driving electric vehicles.

If you are on Facebook and live in NJ, check out https://www.facebook.com/groups/njeaa/

We often go to Cars and Croissants events on weekends with our electric vehicles parked next to Lamborghinis and Ferraris. Also, we get together at Rutgers (Livingston Campus) and other schools or "Green Day" events.

 

[RobertC]

Vike,

Proposing a special tax on this near-nonexistent vehicle category can have no possible motivation aside from a desire to strangle the infant EV market in the crib.

There are still many factions out there with political ties that would like to slow or stop the implementation of EV's at the expense of our environment, health and national security.

jaraczs,

I think that as an immediate solution, they should increase gas tax a little to compensate for it. After all, gasoline is dirt cheap in NJ.

I agree that the gasoline tax in New Jersey is ridiculously cheap, and the gasoline tax in the US is cheap compared to most industrialized countries, but trying to raise the gasoline tax in gas guzzling New Jersey would be political suicide.

 

[sandange]

I think, that destructive impact of the car to the roads depends more on torque and mass of the car than the amount of gasoline consumed for certain distance.
Electric vehicles have relatively high mass and torque compared to ICE vehicles of the similar size. Therefore the tax rate should rather be equal to the ICE vehicles of similar engine torque.

You might consider how much damage and traffic congestion the net work of gas / deisel distribution vehicles contribute to the road conditions.

 

[Kuuuurija]

As much as I know, the asphalt is made of by-product of the gasoline cracking. If there were no ICE cars, then we would not have asphalt roads either.
And electric distribution network requires construction and regular maintenance also and lots of electricians drive around...

 

[jaraczs]

As much as I know, the asphalt is made of by-product of the gasoline cracking. If there were no ICE cars, then we would not have asphalt roads either.

Technologies develop based on availability of resources. Since we decided a century ago to use gas for transportation, we have had lots of asfalt by-product that lends itself as useful component to build roads. You have raised a valid point though - we may need to develop new technology to build roads when we use less gas for the same (or more) volume of roads.

Back to the discussion on road tax, I think that the original proposal of Whelan to charge road tax to ALL vehicles based on actual miles driven is fair (with the exception of EVs because we pay more to the state via sales tax and TEFA tax on electricity). You don't have to deal with gas efficiency, which has nothing to do with road damage. Road damage is primarily linked to miles driven and vehicle weight.
If NJ starts collecting sales tax on gas (California does) it would be a different story.

 

[RobertC]

Kuuuurija wrote:

As much as I know, the asphalt is made of by-product of the gasoline cracking. If there were no ICE cars, then we would not have asphalt roads either.
And electric distribution network requires construction and regular maintenance also and lots of electricians drive around...

I don't think that we will ever see the compete elimination of ICE cars, just an increase of EV's and other alternative fueled vehicles.
The electric distribution network is already in place and is being maintained. There will be new construction for EV charge stations, but typically electrical equipment requires very little maintenance.

 

[jaraczs]

The following is a copy of an email that I sent to my New Jersey representatives:
...
Bob Corson

Did you get any response from Whelan? Because I did not. There is not even any discussion on the facebook page with his proposal. The more I think about it, the more I believe that this man is a moron.

Aside from the income role of a tax, it has also regulation role. In this context, the road tax calculated per gallon stimulates (in principle) drivers to operate more efficient vehicles. That way, you pay less tax, right? So this philosophy should be preserved when trying to implement alternative fuels. You want to drive gas guzler? You pay more tax!

The road tax in NJ has not been increased for 21 years and politicians have no idea how to fix it? There is no sales tax on gas in NJ!! How about that? Still no idea?

 

[RobertC]

Did you get any response from Whelan? Because I did not.

I did not get a reply from Whelan, but I did receive a letter from Assembleymen John Amodeo and Chris Brown thanking me for my support of the proposed bill? Also included in the letter was the line "We will keep your comment sin mind ...". Sin mind? I'm not sure that any of these politicians possesses the capacity to comprehend this issue (or any others).

 

[jray3]

Don't despair. The Seattle EV Association succeeded this session in preventing a 25% increase in Washington's EV Road Tax ($100 registration surcharge) We did it with testimony before committees and letter-writing rather than ringing the capital with honking EVs.. The $100 fee goes away if and when a mileage-based road user tax gets passed.

SEVA also got a bill passed which fines any vehicle that's blocking a charging station $124. (This includes EVs that aren't plugged in, out of fairness.) We'll see if some punks start running ahead of the meter maids unplugging EVs!

 

[Don]

As much as I know, the asphalt is made of by-product of the gasoline cracking. If there were no ICE cars, then we would not have asphalt roads either.

But if we didn't have gas and diesel cars/trucks dripping gas, diesel and motor oil on that asphalt, it would likely last nearly forever

The last thing ANY state needs is an uninformed legislator proposing rules/taxes/restrictions about things he/she knows nothing about . . . . unfortunately, every state and Washington too has an overabundance of them - Pass a law first and then sit back and see how it harms the things you're supposedly trying to save

Don

 

[psyflyjohn]

The California legislature is considering a bill to reduce licensing fees for ev's in order to facilitate sales. I suspect "red" and "blue" states will divide themselves on this issue...

 

[Kuuuurija]

But if we didn't have gas and diesel cars/trucks dripping gas, diesel and motor oil on that asphalt, it would likely last nearly forever

Really?
Can you provide me some links to the sources, proving, that spilling of oil products on roads is the most damaging factor?