12 ms·

Why a tonnage limit for electric vehicles. It's obviously not entirely for GHG reasons. 2T is not all that heavy for EVs.

olabyne 3y ago
What ? It is. 2T means a 70kwh+ battery, an heresy on a planet with limited resources. In Europe there is decent EVs with a 1.4-1.5T weight (Zoe/208/fiat)
- quonn 3y ago
  The Zoe is not being produced anymore and has a 0 of 5 possible stars safety rating.
Rygian 3y ago
There's a tonnage limit for all vehicles. The only difference is +400 kg allowed if it's an EV.
buro9 3y ago
Weight is the best way to tax vehicles. It correlates to the amount of energy needed to move it, generally with the size of the vehicle, and highly with the particulate pollution from brakes and tyres (yes I'm aware of regenerative braking), as well as the amount of wear and tear on the roads and infrastructure, etc. European cities were never built for large vehicles, we should be going towards smaller vehicles, a Fiat 500 EV would be well within the limits described (at only 980 kg) even without the extra weight allowed by EVs. Even if one argues an EV is good for the environment... they could still be better for the environment by being smaller and weighing less as it would take less energy to move them. But looking at things like the Mercedes EQS SUV (3,375 kg), I drove behind one of these at the weekend and it is huge, it was scary seeing it pass a cyclist on a narrow London street. Living in a dense capital city, I would love if London followed suit here.
- neoberg 3y ago
  Not only the energy though. "Tire emissions" are a serious problem and it's competing with ICE emissions. EV's are considerably heavier so they produce lots of fine particles from the tires. Maybe in the North America they're not that important since other cars are as heavy (SUVs and Trucks). But in Europe, EV's are by far the heaviest of the regular use vehicles.
- quonn 3y ago
  > Weight is the best way to tax vehicles. No it isn't. Even the most simple look into EV database would have shown that this is flat out wrong. There are heavy and big vehicles in there using very little energy and small ones using a lot. So what should be taxed is the actual efficiency - either per individual vehicle which would also incentivise reasonable driving (could be easily done by either submitting two numbers, similar to what is already submitted to insurance) - or by using the test ratings which is a good approximation.
  - alberto180 3y ago
    No why should you ignore road deterioration? Road deterioration is Weight^4
  - jabl 3y ago
    It's quite tricky actually. There's other negative externalities from car usage apart from the energy usage, like tire and brake dust, congestion, accidents, and road wear. And using up limited space in cities for parking. Etc. etc. Even if you only wanted to tax energy usage, that clearly correlated with the amount of fuel or electricity used. Taxing liquid fuel is common and a sensible choice, however you can't slap on a big tax on electricity in general since if anything we want to encourage electricity use in favor of fossil fuels (e.g. heat pumps powered by zero-carbon electricity instead of gas heating, or indeed EV's instead of ICE vehicles). And arguably for electricity, it would be better by slapping a CO2 tax on the producers (or some roughly equivalent scheme like cap-and-trade) rather than taxing electricity generally. And of course, if you want to tax by miles driven, that then gets into all kinds of problems how to track that in a way that doesn't enroach on people's privacy. Say, checking the odometer during yearly inspections? So where does that leave taxing EV's? Maybe a flat yearly fee based on the weight isn't that terrible, and it's at least cheap to administer and doesn't leave much space for cheating. Although that is of course very unfair to those who live out in the boonies where parking space is not at a premium and drive very little.
    - quonn 3y ago
      You can slap a tax on the car. You simply take energy used/miles driven and that's your multiplier for a yearly vehicle tax. It could be collected by insurance companies (that usually require you to submit the miles driven anyway) on behalf of the government . As for the other things, such as congestion, I believe it when I see proof that there is a big difference between cars. Even if there is, the priority right now should be energy efficiency, because reducing CO2 emissions is fairly urgent.
- hetspookjee 3y ago
  While I agree entirely I just wanna correct you for a bit: The Gross Vehicle Weight (GVWR)refers to the maximum weight a vehicle is designed to carry including the net weight of the vehicle with accessories, plus the weight of passengers, fuel, and cargo, which is indeed a hefty 3375 kg. The Weight Unladen (EU) is still a ridiculous 2810 kg for the EQS SUV 580 4matic
  - buro9 3y ago
    thanks, I did wonder if I was making a fair comparison I won't edit, as your correction is clear and the context would remain
  - tremon 3y ago
    Wait, what? A 3-tonne vehicle that can only carry a measly 500kg of cargo, including the driver and passengers? Who approved that idea, and how come they still have their job?
Muromec 3y ago
Of course it's as much an environment tax as it is a show-off tax.
Ekaros 3y ago
Why not? Isn't it immensely good thing to guide manufacturers to make lighter and smaller EVs? Less resources and less energy spend. After all the goal is to lower emissions so attacking on all areas should be the way to go. You want an EV, you must accept that it is smaller and lighter than other options.
lagadu 3y ago
2T is a lot for EVs! Take Tesla for example: all their 4 cars 3 are huge and the only one who is just barely below the limit is larger than the vast majority of cars on the road: the 3 often doesn't fit on parking spots neatly and has trouble with narrower streets.

olabyne 3y ago

What ? It is. 2T means a 70kwh+ battery, an heresy on a planet with limited resources. In Europe there is decent EVs with a 1.4-1.5T weight (Zoe/208/fiat)

quonn 3y ago
The Zoe is not being produced anymore and has a 0 of 5 possible stars safety rating.

Rygian 3y ago

There's a tonnage limit for all vehicles. The only difference is +400 kg allowed if it's an EV.

buro9 3y ago

Weight is the best way to tax vehicles. It correlates to the amount of energy needed to move it, generally with the size of the vehicle, and highly with the particulate pollution from brakes and tyres (yes I'm aware of regenerative braking), as well as the amount of wear and tear on the roads and infrastructure, etc. European cities were never built for large vehicles, we should be going towards smaller vehicles, a Fiat 500 EV would be well within the limits described (at only 980 kg) even without the extra weight allowed by EVs. Even if one argues an EV is good for the environment... they could still be better for the environment by being smaller and weighing less as it would take less energy to move them. But looking at things like the Mercedes EQS SUV (3,375 kg), I drove behind one of these at the weekend and it is huge, it was scary seeing it pass a cyclist on a narrow London street. Living in a dense capital city, I would love if London followed suit here.

neoberg 3y ago
Not only the energy though. "Tire emissions" are a serious problem and it's competing with ICE emissions. EV's are considerably heavier so they produce lots of fine particles from the tires. Maybe in the North America they're not that important since other cars are as heavy (SUVs and Trucks). But in Europe, EV's are by far the heaviest of the regular use vehicles.
quonn 3y ago
> Weight is the best way to tax vehicles. No it isn't. Even the most simple look into EV database would have shown that this is flat out wrong. There are heavy and big vehicles in there using very little energy and small ones using a lot. So what should be taxed is the actual efficiency - either per individual vehicle which would also incentivise reasonable driving (could be easily done by either submitting two numbers, similar to what is already submitted to insurance) - or by using the test ratings which is a good approximation.
- alberto180 3y ago
  No why should you ignore road deterioration? Road deterioration is Weight^4
- jabl 3y ago
  It's quite tricky actually. There's other negative externalities from car usage apart from the energy usage, like tire and brake dust, congestion, accidents, and road wear. And using up limited space in cities for parking. Etc. etc. Even if you only wanted to tax energy usage, that clearly correlated with the amount of fuel or electricity used. Taxing liquid fuel is common and a sensible choice, however you can't slap on a big tax on electricity in general since if anything we want to encourage electricity use in favor of fossil fuels (e.g. heat pumps powered by zero-carbon electricity instead of gas heating, or indeed EV's instead of ICE vehicles). And arguably for electricity, it would be better by slapping a CO2 tax on the producers (or some roughly equivalent scheme like cap-and-trade) rather than taxing electricity generally. And of course, if you want to tax by miles driven, that then gets into all kinds of problems how to track that in a way that doesn't enroach on people's privacy. Say, checking the odometer during yearly inspections? So where does that leave taxing EV's? Maybe a flat yearly fee based on the weight isn't that terrible, and it's at least cheap to administer and doesn't leave much space for cheating. Although that is of course very unfair to those who live out in the boonies where parking space is not at a premium and drive very little.
  - quonn 3y ago
    You can slap a tax on the car. You simply take energy used/miles driven and that's your multiplier for a yearly vehicle tax. It could be collected by insurance companies (that usually require you to submit the miles driven anyway) on behalf of the government . As for the other things, such as congestion, I believe it when I see proof that there is a big difference between cars. Even if there is, the priority right now should be energy efficiency, because reducing CO2 emissions is fairly urgent.
hetspookjee 3y ago
While I agree entirely I just wanna correct you for a bit: The Gross Vehicle Weight (GVWR)refers to the maximum weight a vehicle is designed to carry including the net weight of the vehicle with accessories, plus the weight of passengers, fuel, and cargo, which is indeed a hefty 3375 kg. The Weight Unladen (EU) is still a ridiculous 2810 kg for the EQS SUV 580 4matic
- buro9 3y ago
  thanks, I did wonder if I was making a fair comparison I won't edit, as your correction is clear and the context would remain
- tremon 3y ago
  Wait, what? A 3-tonne vehicle that can only carry a measly 500kg of cargo, including the driver and passengers? Who approved that idea, and how come they still have their job?

Muromec 3y ago

Of course it's as much an environment tax as it is a show-off tax.

Ekaros 3y ago

Why not? Isn't it immensely good thing to guide manufacturers to make lighter and smaller EVs? Less resources and less energy spend. After all the goal is to lower emissions so attacking on all areas should be the way to go. You want an EV, you must accept that it is smaller and lighter than other options.

lagadu 3y ago

2T is a lot for EVs! Take Tesla for example: all their 4 cars 3 are huge and the only one who is just barely below the limit is larger than the vast majority of cars on the road: the 3 often doesn't fit on parking spots neatly and has trouble with narrower streets.