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Electric vehicles licence fees


DeepBass9

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Out of curiosity for those with EVs, what licence fees are you charged? Are they the same as an equivalent normal vehicle? 

A lot of govt revenue comes from fuel taxes, have they thought about what will happen when more electric vehicles are on the road and they are no longer getting fuel levy?

Also if Eskom wasn't so pathetic, they would surely be embracing and encouraging electric vehicles, as this would provide a new revenue stream. Imagine Eskom branded fast charging stations.

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1 hour ago, Fuenkli said:

they are 🤣

Allegedly a few years ago there was a international motor manufacturer in SA who wanted to discuss with gov about getting more charging stations all around SA, because without that their electric cars where not going to sell.

They stopped after negotiations did not go as planned. It was alleged afterwards that they stopped the negotiations as they where not prepared to pay alleged bribes.

Now that Eskom wants more revenue NOW they want to get back into the vehicle charging game. Ok, lets take what we can get.

So the next hurdle: "45% import taxes and duties on EV"? 

Because this is great ... "The writing is on the wall – electric vehicles will be the transport medium of the future and we as South Africa need to be part of the movement, or risk massive losses if we are not geared for this new wave of technology.", if more people can afford one.

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If someone could locally manufacture, 45% tariff protection is quite supportive.

I'm seriously considering selling my 2 motorbikes and getting an electric bike. As long as it can get me to Joburg and back on a single charge it could work for me.

One of these https://www.timeslive.co.za/motoring/new-models/2019-02-26-zero-motorcycles-unveils-its-petrol-slaying-srf-electric-bike/

Edited by DeepBass9
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3 hours ago, DeepBass9 said:

As long as it can get me to Joburg and back on a single charge it could work for me.

https://www.zeromotorcycles.com/range/

Must say, if it was not for the fact that:
1) I had a bike accident, car never saw me, just drove over my bike's front wheel. Just scratches.
2) My wife was in hospital, she never saw the car coming.
3) My friend is on crutches and has to carry a bag for the rest of his life after he t-boned a car that drove in front of him, 1 year hospital.
I cannot trust other drivers on the road where bikes are on. Other than that, I would love to have a electric bike in the city!!!

Edited by Guest
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8 hours ago, The Terrible Triplett said:

Allegedly a few years ago there was a international motor manufacturer in SA who wanted to discuss with gov about getting more charging stations all around SA, because without that their electric cars where not going to sell.

Optimal energy Joule perhaps ?

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With the existing furore over etolls, I'm not sure that would be popular. The fuel levey is quite good at that though, more inefficient and heavy vehicles pay more. I was wondering what the plan is for when your fuel usage is zero, and all your power comes via Eskom or solar.

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On 2019/07/08 at 10:52 AM, plonkster said:

The obvious answer is to tax the electricity at the (fast) charging stations.

😛

 

Except you'll find that the primary source of supply to an EV is a domestic wall-plug.....fast charging is only necessary to keep EV's going on longer trips or for top-ups. The funding model will have to be completely re-worked.

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1 minute ago, PeterP said:

Except you'll find that the primary source of supply to an EV is a domestic wall-plug.....fast charging is only necessary to keep EV's going on longer trips or for top-ups. The funding model will have to be completely re-worked.

I was thinking more in line with European/American setups where it is common to charge your car at work or even when visiting a shopping center, precisely because it works out cheaper in some manner or because it is more convenient. So my tongue in cheek comment is somewhat based on the knowledge all South Africans have that we likely won't see a network of fast chargers any time soon, because obvious ways of accessing money flows just never seems obvious to those in power around here...

My thinking is things like schools and hospitals. Run a state hospital that's on par with the private ones, and guess what will happen: Rich people will use it, medical aids will love it (cause it will be slightly cheaper than private care), and you get to charge them money which you can then use to help fund your services to the poor. Run state schools on par with private ones, and again: Rich people will send their kids there, you get to charge them more money on a sliding scale (but less than a private school), and again, your funding becomes better.

But no....

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The infrastructure for charging stations is already there, its called petrol stations. They all have an Eskom connection, you just need to plonk down the charging station, plug it in, hook up the credit card payments and away you go. If Eskom doesn't do that, they someone else will soon enough.

Maybe start with the large stations on the toll roads. They are about every 100-200km.

Edited by DeepBass9
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Google suggests that 90% of EV charging in the US currently takes place at home overnight - taxing fast charging won't cut it. We currently pay about 1/3 tax on our fuel - that's R6-8K (rough calc) on an average vehicle pa. It's going to be a challenge.

 

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45 minutes ago, DeepBass9 said:

plonk down the charging station

Well, that's perhaps a bit too simplistic. A Tesla fast-charger peaks at 150kW. You're going to need a dedicated feeder for the charging station, especially if you have more than a single charging bay.

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On 2019/07/08 at 8:09 AM, DeepBass9 said:

The fuel levy is quite good at that though, more inefficient and heavy vehicles pay more.

<< RANT START >>>

Did a +-600km return delivery yesterday doing my best yet I only could get 44l per 100km or 2.27km/l - driving slower adds to the hours on the road = more overtime.

Some cars today do a easy 20km/l - some more - so their fuel levies are not bad at all per tank.
Their license costs per year are wot R350-R850 per annum?
... so the rich who can afford those cars, get "richer". 🙂 

Don't want to know what a trucks license fees costs, and the trailer/s ... it is thousands per annum.

Yet everyone needs food right, incl the poor. Everyone needs to buy stuff, even the poor.
So the poor helps pay for the enormous fuel levies and licencing costs on delivery vehicles.

... the rich get richer.

<< RANT END >>>

So some are worried about how electric cars are going to be billed as their is no fuel levy possible nor does a electricity levy make easy sense.
And if they increase the licensing costs to recoup some of the "losses" their will be a lot of bitching and moaning or lower or no EV sales.
Yet the roads and road infrastructure needs to be maintained.
And the tolls have failed horrendously in Gauteng.

So I say: Ag siestog ... I'm SO sorry to hear about your EV licencing problem ... toughen up you buttercups!   🤣

K_K en betaal is die wet van Transvaal - translated - Their are no free lunches. (... does not come close to the Afr version.)

This problem is brewing, and I see no easy sensible fix, other than dedicated chargers that has a levy applied on them per kw/h, to pay for the roads.



 

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The beauty of a fuel levy is precisely that the user pays. Drive more... pay more. Drive a more fuel efficient car and you essentially get an environmental discount. Drive a lighter car and you get a discount for less road damage. Drive a truck, sorry bud... those cause the most road damage. Simple facts. So there is a pretty good correlation between fuel cost and road use. The levy works well (though I have objections to how much it has become... something is wrong somewhere).

EVs have the problem that they are primarily short-distance second-vehicle runners that by definition don't do many miles in a year. The cost per km is already pretty terrible, sometimes rivaling a meter taxi. You really cannot afford an additional licensing cost, not if you actually want to promote uptake at least.

My idea with the charging stations -- and @PeterP is perfectly correct that it does not hold up even in the USA -- is that if you make it sufficiently convenient to charge at a supercharger, you can levy a tax without scaring off the users. There should be enough margin. I personally would much rather charge once a week (or so) while going out for coffee on a Saturday or something like that, and just have it billed to the "petrol card". But I must admit... my idea is probably pie in the sky.

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Right now I think we have a situation pretty similar to the Petrol-vs-Diesel debate of about a decade ago. The Diesel vehicle generally costs around 10%-20% more than its petrol brother (with a few exceptions, I seem to recall that for Mercedes Benz C-class of the period, the Diesel was actually cheaper), and also costs more to service and maintain. But Diesel was slightly less expensive and because Diesel has a higher carbon content per volume, you got better consumption, so over time the Diesel would claw back the extra cost. The question was: How far do I have to drive it to recover the extra cost.

The answer was often in excess of 200 000km. I remember one notable case, the Chev Captiva Diesel, for which the answer was essentially "never!".

(Even the Corolla Diesel I owned and sold last month never recovered its additional cost. The higher service cost perfectly absorbed the lower running costs, making it on par with the popular and common-as-weeds 1.6 liter petrol model).

For me electrical cars now present the same problem: They are more expensive to buy, but cheaper to own in the long run. How far do I have to drive it to get my money back? Well, just accept that you're not going to drive it very far and forget about getting your money back...

I really really want an electric car. Do not get me wrong. But right now they are toys for the upper middle-class and the rich.

Edited by plonkster
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9 minutes ago, plonkster said:

 

EVs have the problem that they are primarily short-distance second-vehicle runners that by definition don't do many miles in a year. The cost per km is already pretty terrible, sometimes rivaling a meter taxi. You really cannot afford an additional licensing cost, not if you actually want to promote uptake at least.

 

The cost per km for an EV about R0.35.....a 15km/litre car is over R1.00. And this is before you add in maintenance and depreciation both of which favour EV's. There is room to create parity once upfront cost of EV's is equal to ICE.

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6 minutes ago, PeterP said:

The cost per km for an EV about R0.35

If you only consider fuel cost, yes.

TCO (total cost of ownership) is somthing different. Say I buy a Nissan Leaf at around half a mill (to make the math easy).

First up, opportunity cost. I have to either borrow the 500k or take it out of another interest bearing vehicle. So I immediately lose say 6% a year. That's 30k a year.

Second, devaluation. Let's assume the typical 10%, though I think that is optimistic for EVs, at least right now. That's another 50k a year.

So before I even look at fuel cost and insurance, I'm at 80k/year. Even if I drive 10 000km a year (I do about 12 000km in my main ICE vehicle), I'm still at R8/km. A meter taxi is R10/km.

What makes this worse is that I cannot have the EV as my main vehicle, so this is in addition to keeping an ICE vehicle.

A well-kept second hand ICE vehicle runs at half the price easily.

Edited by plonkster
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But to be fair, let me add a big disclaimer: YMMV (your mileage may vary). Which is to say, your circumstances may be different.

I have two vehicles in the household. A newer larger vehicle for the longer distances, and a smaller easy-to-park older one that mostly stays home. The larger one does 12 000km a year. The smaller one does 5000km/year.

I can't replace the larger one with an EV. Not yet. The smaller one is a perfect candidate... but I will always divide whatever it costs by a mere 5000km. So cost per km will always be ridiculously high and it only makes sense if this second vehicle is ridiculously cheap to own. Which it is. It is old, it has stopped devalueing. It's Japanese and doesn't break down too often.

I wish I could replace it with an EV... but I can't.

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23 minutes ago, plonkster said:

Drive a more fuel efficient car and you essentially get an environmental discount.

Drive a lighter car and you get a discount for less road damage. Drive a truck, sorry bud... those cause the most road damage. Simple facts.

Environmental discount - here is the thing, you have a ICE vehicle that has already "paid" the "environmental damage fee".
Now you are told to sell it, because of it being inefficient, costing even more ito "environmental damage".
Your old ICe vehicle goes to the next owner, who cannot afford a EV.
And by the time your EV's batteries are done and dusted, chances are slim that the guy who bought you old ICE vehicle, can afford to replace them if he buys your half a bar EV. 

Versus being able to convert your existing ICE to a EV, or at least partly, to not have to have a EV and a ICE in one, for city and long distances.

Drive a truck - dude, who in their right mind will buy a truck for private or leisurely use? 🙂 
Absolutely everything in your life - at home and at the office everywhere you go - was on a truck at one stage and YOU payed for that.
Driving a private car, now that should be taxed more, as it is your private vehicle that is using the roads.
Trucks should not be levied so excessively, as it is the blood on the "arteries (roads)" of a countries economy. 

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