Electric vehicle advocates in New York are supporting the Biden administration’s policy intended to speed-up a transition away from gas-burning cars and trucks.
“It’s huge,” said Barry Carr, Executive Director of Clean Communities of CNY. “A lot of it isn’t just more efficient vehicles… the level of interest is [also] due to climate change.”
President Biden announced new regulations that mandate higher fuel efficiency for vehicles and require half of all vehicles sold by 2030 to be hybrid or fully electric. Experts say this will increase public acceptance, partly because automakers will be able to bring down prices. While it’s inefficient to manufacture 5,000 cars a year, it’s very efficient to manufacture 50,000, said Carr.
A typical EV has about one-third of the parts of an internal combustion car.
To help promote EV usage, the Biden administration wants to add 500,000 new charging stations. In New York State, “They are starting to require EV infrastructure in the building code. So, if you’re building a commercial office building or a residential house, you have to put in circuit breaker and power requirements to add EV chargers,” noted Carr.
Such policies – and a wide agreement by auto makers – will help the transition to EVs, which the administration and environmentalist say is necessary to scale back global warming emissions.
Source: WAER 88.3
