Ontario, the most populous province in Canada, will be introducing a new electric truck rebate program — designed to provide up to 60% of the incremental purchase cost of an electric truck, as compared to a conventional diesel equivalent. There’s an upper limit of CAD$75,000 per unit.
The aim of the new rebate program will be to speed the adoption of electric trucks in the province, reportedly, as one would expect. Considering that most of the population and industry of Ontario is located within a fairly compact area — and also that the province gets much of its electricity from hydroelectric and old nuclear power stations — the rebate program (and the widespread adoption of electric trucks there) seems a fairly sensible thing to do.
As you may recall, BYD recently announced that it would be building a new electric vehicle assembly facility in Ontario — owing to fast growing demand in the province for electric truck and bus solutions.
CleanTechnica reports: “The rebates are contingent on funding, which for the current fiscal year has been capped at $12 million (Canadian dollars).”
Reuters adds: “Ontario’s new Green Commercial Vehicle Program, which also gives rebates on other fuel-saving devices, helps brings the province in line with other jurisdictions like Quebec, California, and New York states, which offer incentives to defray the higher costs of electric trucks.”
As you may recall, the large Canadian grocer Loblaw put its first all-electric truck (a BYD unit) into service fairly recently, and also just placed a pre-order for 25 units of the upcoming Tesla Semi (the pre-order tally for which now numbers over 400).
And, as you may also recall, Ontario is currently working to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 15% (as compared to 1990 levels) by 2020; and 37% by 2030. Those are relatively tough goals to achieve (even if perhaps nowhere near enough to avoid extreme anthropogenic climate change)…
Note that Ontario also offers some of the highest incentives in the world for electric cars. “Residents of Canada’s largest province can qualify for up to C$14,000 in rebates if they buy a five-passenger electric car with a battery larger than 16 kWh that has an MSRP of less than C$75,000.”
Imagine if others provide a big incentive like that. All trucks could be electric in a short time. What a difference that will make. Ontario is setting the bar for others to follow.
In the states all they need to do is stop subsidizing OIL and fuel prices will go up 4 times what they are today. Or Increase the fuel tax which hasn’t gone up for 20 years or put a tax on pollution. But that has not happened for 50 years so I’ll just have to move back to Canada.