When will they start charging RUC for electric cars?

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floydbloke

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# 215477 29-Jun-2017 10:39

Slightly provocative topic heading perhaps, but I’ve been wondering how road building and maintenance will be funded as electric vehicles become more pervasive. There must come a time in the not too distant feature when there is not enough petrol being bought and taxes gathered from that becomes insufficient.

Thoughts and ideas? Road User Charges? Rego fees?

"I have noticed even people who claim everything is predestined, and that we can do nothing to change it, look before they cross the road." - Stephen Hawking

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# 1808726 29-Jun-2017 10:46

I would laugh if we put a tax on using an electric car as they dont generate as much revenue through tax collection.
How ever they still use power which is taxed.

If they were to tax electric vehicles, you may as well be taxing push bikes and prams.

If anything the government should be giving tax credits in exchange for being carbon neutral. I think there was a scheme like this with urgent couriers a few years ago? I can't remember.
If they cant give you any incentive to move to an electric car then this government is dead to this country and have no regard for our future.

*Edited wording and added a sentence.

Stu

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# 1808733 29-Jun-2017 10:52

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@Coil RUC is charged for all diesel vehicles, so why should electric be any different? They all use the same road so the requirement for the RUC charges should be the same.

Keep calm, and carry on posting.

Coil

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# 1808734 29-Jun-2017 10:55

Stu:

@Coil RUC is charged for all diesel vehicles, so why should electric be any different? They all use the same road so the requirement for the RUC charges should be the same.

Indeed it is, The reason they charge RUC for diesel vehicles is that they dont charge it at the pump. They then calculate the weight and the spreading of that weight over axles to charge the vehicle per KM. The more weight per sq inch in what ever combination the more you pay.

The electric vehicle is charged from power, Which someone pays to a power company who charges GST. As far as i am concerned this vehicle has already been taxed. The govt doesnt have to counter in emissions taxes or anything else.

Road damage is no different from a petrol vehicle. I am not sure but does the government use money fromt he tax from petrol to put into roading?

ockel

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# 1808735 29-Jun-2017 10:56

With 3 million light passenger vehicles and 4 million total vehicles if NZ hits the Govt milestone of 64,000 EV's in the next few years they will still only represent less than 2% of total vehicles.

Unlikely to be a big revenue drain for a number of years.

Stu

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# 1808739 29-Jun-2017 11:03

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@Coil yes, but diesel is also taxed, it just doesn't have the RUC component as petrol does. The RUC for petrol is a component of the price, not just a larger blanket tax amount on petrol itself, so yes there is a calculable figure from the sale of petrol that goes back into roading.

Keep calm, and carry on posting.

Talkiet

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# 1808743 29-Jun-2017 11:04

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Coil:

Stu:

@Coil RUC is charged for all diesel vehicles, so why should electric be any different? They all use the same road so the requirement for the RUC charges should be the same.

Indeed it is, The reason they charge RUC for diesel vehicles is that they dont charge it at the pump. They then calculate the weight and the spreading of that weight over axles to charge the vehicle per KM. The more weight per sq inch in what ever combination the more you pay.

The electric vehicle is charged from power, Which someone pays to a power company who charges GST. As far as i am concerned this vehicle has already been taxed. The govt doesnt have to counter in emissions taxes or anything else.

Road damage is no different from a petrol vehicle. I am not sure but does the government use money fromt he tax from petrol to put into roading?

Are you being serious? You think that the current (no pun intended) taxes from electricity consumption have been scaled to support road maintenance? I'll answer that for you, no it hasn't. It's entirely reasonable to expect road users to pay for road maintenance.

I hate it when fashionable technologies are given unfair tax breaks or credits - all that does is encourage their use for the wrong reasons. Sometimes it's appropriate to kick start a process, but I think we're well past that point where electric vehicles are seen as a curiosity and their owners shouldn't be getting a free ride on road maintenance.

Cheers - N

Please note all comments are the product of my own brain and don't necessarily represent the position or opinions of my employer, previous employers, colleagues, friends or pets.

MikeAqua

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# 1808745 29-Jun-2017 11:05

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Tax on petrol has several components (source): -

59.524 cents - National Land Transport Fund
6.90 cents - ACC Motor Vehicle Account
0.66 cents - Local Authorities Fuel Tax
0.2 cents - Petroleum or Engine Fuels Monitoring Levy
GST (on the petrol and the other taxes)

EVs should make a contribution to all of these except the fuels monitoring levy because: -

- EVs pose an accident risk (ACC)

- EVs use the road network (National and local roads funding).

- Almost everything is liable for GST so it simpler not to have exemptions.

I would like to see RUC on a per km basis for all registered vehicles, with an extra charge for the particular levy for petroleum vehicles.

Currently anyone who uses petrol for anything pays the road network charges. So for example if you own petrol pwoered boat that lives in a marina you pay road network charges every time you operate it.

Mike

dafman

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# 1808770 29-Jun-2017 11:07

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Exempting electric from RUC, or introducing a lower RUC for them, may be a small incentive the govt could use to encourage drivers to switch to the lower carbon option?

Talkiet

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# 1808773 29-Jun-2017 11:08

http://www.transport.govt.nz/land/roadusercharges/

"Charges for light petrol and diesel vehicles In New Zealand, light vehicle users pay for their use of roads through either fuel excise duty (currently 56.5 cents per litre on petrol) or road user charges (for diesel vehicles and other vehicles not subject to fuel excise duty). All vehicles are also subject to an annual licensing fee (commonly known as the registration, or “rego”), which varies according to whether the vehicle uses petrol or diesel.

On average, petrol and diesel vehicle users pay the same amount, but the different charging systems mean that some people pay more, and some less. The following link explains the differences in charges, and the reasons vehicles with different fuel types are treated differently."

Cheers - N

Please note all comments are the product of my own brain and don't necessarily represent the position or opinions of my employer, previous employers, colleagues, friends or pets.

MikeAqua

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# 1808776 29-Jun-2017 11:13

dafman:

Exempting electric from RUC, or introducing a lower RUC for them, may be a small incentive the govt could use to encourage drivers to switch to the lower carbon option?

An incentive that will be outweighed by the substantially higher purchase prices of affordable/family EVs.

To create a true incentive, I think you would actually have to burden ICEVs with a substantial extra cost.

One of the Scandi countries does this via a massive purchase tax on ICEVs (originally introduced to protect their domestic EV industry). It works for them.

Mike

Ge0rge

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# 1808803 29-Jun-2017 11:23

Coil:

Stu:

@Coil RUC is charged for all diesel vehicles, so why should electric be any different? They all use the same road so the requirement for the RUC charges should be the same.

Indeed it is, The reason they charge RUC for diesel vehicles is that they dont charge it at the pump. They then calculate the weight and the spreading of that weight over axles to charge the vehicle per KM. The more weight per sq inch in what ever combination the more you pay.

The electric vehicle is charged from power, Which someone pays to a power company who charges GST. As far as i am concerned this vehicle has already been taxed. The govt doesnt have to counter in emissions taxes or anything else.

Road damage is no different from a petrol vehicle. I am not sure but does the government use money fromt he tax from petrol to put into roading?

By the same argument @Coil, diesel also attracts GST when you purchase it - so why doesn''t your same logic apply to that too? Not having a go, but at some stage there is going to have to be a tax put on EV's in order to maintain the tax take. When this will occur I don't know, but there will have to be a critical mass of them on the roads before it does.

Coil

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# 1808806 29-Jun-2017 11:28

Talkiet:

Coil:

Stu:

@Coil RUC is charged for all diesel vehicles, so why should electric be any different? They all use the same road so the requirement for the RUC charges should be the same.

Indeed it is, The reason they charge RUC for diesel vehicles is that they dont charge it at the pump. They then calculate the weight and the spreading of that weight over axles to charge the vehicle per KM. The more weight per sq inch in what ever combination the more you pay.

The electric vehicle is charged from power, Which someone pays to a power company who charges GST. As far as i am concerned this vehicle has already been taxed. The govt doesnt have to counter in emissions taxes or anything else.

Road damage is no different from a petrol vehicle. I am not sure but does the government use money fromt he tax from petrol to put into roading?

Are you being serious? You think that the current (no pun intended) taxes from electricity consumption have been scaled to support road maintenance? I'll answer that for you, no it hasn't. It's entirely reasonable to expect road users to pay for road maintenance.

I hate it when fashionable technologies are given unfair tax breaks or credits - all that does is encourage their use for the wrong reasons. Sometimes it's appropriate to kick start a process, but I think we're well past that point where electric vehicles are seen as a curiosity and their owners shouldn't be getting a free ride on road maintenance.

Cheers - N

Scaling no, The taxes are not fair at this current point in time. There needs to be a better way than charging RUC in this modern day and age for these new vehicles. If they have a system where each charger has its own meter that charges at a certain rate depending on the vehicle class from the rego. As there are many electric cars that do very minimal damage to roads and Porsche Cayenne's that do a lot more. Its a very hard one to put a finger on, I dont expect the government to nail it just yet. Their use does need to be encouraged and i feel that if they start taxing as they do with RUC it will be a turn off. If you want to use electronic RUC charging it would cost you about $40-$$70 a month depending on what you want to have on the device, Otherwise you need to waste your charge going past a post office to get a paper label.

@Ruki, Thoughts?

wellygary

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# 1808826 29-Jun-2017 11:40

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RUC will need to be reformed before it can realistically be applied to EVs

The current RUC rates severely overtax light vehicles, with one size of under 3.5 tonne, along with a rate that is only slightly lower than the 3-5 - 6 tonne truck class (6.2c v 6.8c/km)

The current RUC rate pretty much killed the small diesel car market, and would be a big hand brake on EVs

MikeAqua

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# 1808840 29-Jun-2017 11:53

4 people support this post

RUC is a pretty good system. Rates are set by vehicle weight. You pay for each km you do. Risk (ACC) and wear and tear is proportional to distance covered.

A criticism of the current RUC system [as noted by wellygary] is the lack of differentiation between vehicles in the 0 - 3,500 kg class.

Land transport say this is because they have no info on the difference in road wear caused by a 1,000 kg vehicle and a 3,500 kg vehicle.

We have to look at some way of maintaining contributions to ACC and road networks by road users. Not just as EVs increase in number but as ICEVs become more efficient.

Mike

Coil

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# 1808841 29-Jun-2017 11:54

Ge0rge:

Coil:

Stu:

@Coil RUC is charged for all diesel vehicles, so why should electric be any different? They all use the same road so the requirement for the RUC charges should be the same.

Indeed it is, The reason they charge RUC for diesel vehicles is that they dont charge it at the pump. They then calculate the weight and the spreading of that weight over axles to charge the vehicle per KM. The more weight per sq inch in what ever combination the more you pay.

The electric vehicle is charged from power, Which someone pays to a power company who charges GST. As far as i am concerned this vehicle has already been taxed. The govt doesnt have to counter in emissions taxes or anything else.

Road damage is no different from a petrol vehicle. I am not sure but does the government use money fromt he tax from petrol to put into roading?

By the same argument @Coil, diesel also attracts GST when you purchase it - so why doesn''t your same logic apply to that too? Not having a go, but at some stage there is going to have to be a tax put on EV's in order to maintain the tax take. When this will occur I don't know, but there will have to be a critical mass of them on the roads before it does.

Good point, Yeah i was a little quick to jump the gun on saying they tax you GST on power so thats enough.
To put things into perspective i would like to see how much it costs lets say a tesla model s 60 for 1000KM of highway driving at the average cost of power in NZ. How much would it be vrs my average of 9L/100KM in my ancient BMW?

Thats 90L x $2.00 (Average price for 95 as per AA is $1.95 this month) to make it easy. $180 to get 1000KM down the road.

If my car was a diesel and used the same amount of fuel per 100KM @ the national aver of $1.20 this month it would cost me $108 + the RUC at L rating 1000Km is $64.
That would give me a saving of $8 if i had a diesel. Not to mention waiting in line at a post office and putting the label in my window i would happily discard that $8 of savings.

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