New Mexico State Senators Seek To Tax EVs & Renewable Energy
Credit to Author: Jennifer Sensiba| Date: Mon, 23 Dec 2019 18:35:13 +0000
Published on December 23rd, 2019 | by Jennifer Sensiba
December 23rd, 2019 by Jennifer Sensiba
With the 2020 New Mexico legislative session coming up, senators and representatives are pre-filing bills for consideration. Two of these bills seek to tax electric vehicles and renewable energy.
SB 18, filed by Sen. Michael Padilla, a Democrat representing the South Valley just below Albuquerque, seeks to add a 2.5% tax for the wholesale value of each megawatt-hour. While this initially seems like a way to discourage the adoption of renewable energy, the bill does exempt a variety of entities and home renewables. The following entities are exempted from the tax:
Also exempted from the tax is any renewable energy made for self-use by any entity, including home generation like rooftop solar. Excess production beyond one’s personal use of up to 500 kWh per day is also exempted, even when sold back to the grid.
This basically only leaves utility-scale production subjected to the tax, and all income from this tax would go to a fund for early childhood programs in the state.
Another bill, SB 20, would add extra registration fees for electric and hybrid vehicles. The bill was introduced by Sen. Bill Tallman, a Democrat representing part of Northeast Albuquerque.
The bill proposes adding an extra $100 fee for all electric vehicles with a battery of at least 4 kWh and that can be recharged from plugging in, so this would appear to include most plugin-hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV). Hybrids not capable of being charged from plugging in would be subject to a smaller $50 fee.
All funds collected would go to the state road fund, presumably to make up for the decrease in collected gasoline taxes when vehicles use less or no gasoline.
While we don’t know the motivations behind this bill, we do know that many such bills are being filed around the country. In some cases, the fees are rather exorbitant and are clearly meant to discourage EV adoption. In other cases, a small fee is around the amount an equivalent gasoline vehicle would have paid into the roads via gasoline taxes, and may genuinely be designed to keep the roads in good order.
In this case, it appears to be pretty close to what an average vehicle would have paid into the road fund via gasoline taxes. New Mexico charges a $0.17 per gallon tax on gasoline, with most going into the road fund. A 25 MPG vehicle driving 12,000 miles would pay around $82 in such taxes.
While reasonable on the surface, it’s also worth noting that electric vehicle adoption in New Mexico is still very modest, and has probably not resulted in any readily measurable impact on the state’s road fund. Many argue that it would be better to wait until the tax is really needed for road upkeep in the state to help increase early EV adoption.
Follow CleanTechnica on Google News.
It will make you happy & help you live in peace for the rest of your life.
Jennifer Sensiba Jennifer Sensiba is a long time efficient vehicle enthusiast, writer, and photographer. She grew up around a transmission shop, and has been experimenting with vehicle efficiency since she was 16 and drove a Pontiac Fiero. She likes to explore the Southwest US with her partner, kids, and animals.