Operation Laser Kiwi: help us take New Zealand-made energy on the road
"We could put the foot down, or shoot ourselves in the foot". That was Mike Casey's summary of the quite daft proposal to get rid the Clean Car Standard. Fortunately, Transport Minister Chris Bishop has announced it will be staying. That means there's still a chance we could bestow the honourable title of Archbishop of Electrification upon the Minister if he puts the foot down on EV policy!
As he told the Herald: “In feedback on the review, industry noted that the Standard is now well established in New Zealand, with importers accumulating credits and charges over time. Removing it at this stage would be highly disruptive for the vehicle industry. The Government has therefore decided to retain a standard and progress work to calibrate the settings so they are realistic and achievable for industry.”
The demand for EVs is growing rapidly and sales data for June showed full EVs made up over 20% of all new car sales, an increase of over 150% on the same time last year.
“If we hope to meet our growing demand, we need to maintain the confidence of these manufacturers with stable policy settings. New Zealand is currently getting a good supply of electric vehicles, but we can’t take that for granted. Many of the brands are struggling to keep up with demand as it is. If supply is curtailed because our standards are weakened, that will be a wasted opportunity to reduce our reliance on expensive imported energy and help New Zealanders save over time.”
Some vehicle importers and legacy brands have raised the issue of ‘affordability’ to enable them to continue to import inefficient vehicles.
“It’s a false economy,” says Casey. “Their argument is that these inefficient vehicles cost less upfront, but they will cost New Zealanders much more over the vehicle’s lifetime. Instead of allowing old technology in, we should be working on ways to help more New Zealanders access newer technology and that often comes down to better finance schemes.”
Australia reaches a milestone in August, with more new electric cars sold than petrol cars; another new study shows EV batteries last longer than the myths have made out; Heart Aerospace sends the world's heaviest electric plane skywards; China's massive mining machine hits the dirt; and we've fully embraced heat pumps to warm the air, now they're coming for our water.
Read moreDownloadNew Zealand spends about as much on petrol and diesel as it earns exporting concentrated milk. Mike Casey says that money leaves the country, and most of it does not have to. He runs a cherry orchard in Central Otago on 21 electric machines, and a $50,000 diesel bill became a $25,000 revenue stream before financing costs. What I Asked Mike👉 How much money does New Zealand lose every year buying fuel from offshore?👉 What did it actually cost to electrify 21 machines?👉 What is the real payback period, machine by machine?👉 What can you do if you lease your building and cannot touch the roof?👉 Who should not do this?
Read moreDownloadA pinch and a punch (and a big bunch of new EVs) for the first of the month. The Rewiring gang is always pretty jazzed about the release of the new car sales numbers each month and, while the short-term stats tend to bounce around a bit, the long-term trend is clear: sales of new EVs are up by 150% year to date and sales of new petrol vehicles are down by 15% in the same period.
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