Chevy Volt Not Green Enough For California

thecarchik writes "The first two plug-in cars from major manufacturers will go head-to-head on warranties and lease prices: $350 a month for the 2011 Chevrolet Volt, $349 for the 2011 Nissan Leaf. Now the choice shifts to other measures, including electric and overall range, as well as the plug-in perks that states like California offer to early adopters to encourage them to opt for electric cars. This is where it gets interesting. While California loves the Nissan Leaf, current regulations deny Chevy Volt buyers two significant perks: a $5,000 rebate, and permission to drive solo in HOV Lanes."

Comments

I'm puzzled

[0123456]

Apparently California can't afford to pay government employees, but can afford to give money to people who buy electric cars?

Re:I'm puzzled

[Ichijo]

We are also committed to building a high-speed train from Barstow to Lodi, at astonishing cost.

Even more astonishing than the cost of the $45 billion HSR line is the cost of the $80-150 billion alternative of expanding highways and airports just to move the same number of people.

Re:I'm puzzled

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Unfortunately, that isn't how cost psychology works...

Any expenses necessary to maintain the status quo are simply necessary, or even "emergency". They don't count.

Any expenses incurred deviating from the status quo are radical, fiscally imprudent experiments that we can ill-afford.

Any attempt to actually assign numbers to these two categories, and compare them, makes you a pointy-headed wonk who is too boring for television.

Re:I'm puzzled

[uncqual]

Maybe you were right about government being stupid or maybe you're right that they do stupid things just to ruin us.

However, the idiots ultimately responsible for the HSR fiasco in California are the voters who passed passed Prop 1A which provides almost $10B (via bonds) to jumpstart the program. Without passage of Prop 1A, HSR probably would have stalled or died.

Fortunately for Californians, it's pretty easy for those who actually pay taxes to leave the state as it flushes itself down the crapper.

Re:I'm puzzled

[drsmithy]

What if our autobahn, like the German Autobahn, prohibited passing on the right, thus making the far right lane the slowest lane and the far left lane the fastest lane, eliminating large differences in speed between adjacent lanes of traffic?

Still wouldn't work. Lane discipline (and driver awareness in general) in the US is atrocious, and an Autobahn is utterly dependent on good lane discipline to function as intended. You'd just end up with either a) miles of traffic lined up behind some fuckwit in the fast lane pottering along at 85mph awestruck at how fast they were going legally, or b) everyone breaking that law to get past the people in (a).

Incidentally, "no passing on the right" is a bad law, IMHO. "Keep right unless passing" is a much more appropriate way of enforcing lane discipline.

If the US enacted driver training and licensing standards similar to Germany's, Autobahn's might be possible there, but good luck with that.

Re:The leaf is not a hybrid

[AK Marc]

I agree it makes no sense, but it doesn't make sense in the Prius vs Volt comparison. The Leaf vs Volt comparison makes perfect sense. The electric vehicle gets benefits the hybrid doesn't. The article is spending so much time trying to convince us that a hybrid that could be driven as an electric should be treated as such.

Really, the answer is to drop all the regulations and incentives and bump the tax on gasoline and diesel by $5 per gallon. Why tax someone and refund the tax on hybrids that get worse mileage than some smaller cars? Why create all the tax and refund process in the first place? Just tax on usage, and let the rest go. The Free Market will figure it out. People will use less and pay more attention to economy of what they buy. And that will close the budget gap for CA as well (unless done at the national level, in which case it will go a long way towards closing the budget deficit).

Re:The leaf is not a hybrid

[timeOday]

The Prius does not quality for the same rebate as the Leaf because it's not a zero-emissions vehicle. It qualifies for a lesser rebate because it is partial zero-emissions. The Volt qualifies as neither because the requirements are pass-or-fail, and the Volt fails.

Re:The leaf is not a hybrid

[TooMuchToDo]

This is due to the Prius using a vacuum sealed container to keep a heat transfer medium heated, which is used to keep the catalytic converter up to temp. I don't believe the Volt employees this method. Want cheap? Get a Leaf. Want nice, get a Model S. The Volt? Not very good from either cost or luxury.

That's because

[PortHaven]

California is full of idiots who keep electing uber-idiots to office.

Sorry, this is a clear case of typical short-sightedness of politicians. They pass legislation without thinking half a thought about it (heck they pass it without reading it). The result is stupid stuff like this.

(ie: crux of the problem, the Volt's motor is NOT low enough emission for California's liking. So they totally dismiss the fact that said motor will run far less often than an average motor.)

If they passed the law based on an avg. miles per year and the waste emitted on a yearly basis, the Volt would easily make the muster. This is akin to the problem some states had with the Prius. People could not register their Prius' because they could not pass the state emission tests. Because the testing equipment was incompatible with a hybrid vehicles operation. So wait, we have a cleaner, more fuel efficient vehicle but can't register it because of EMISSIONS testing. WTF.)

Let's not even get into the fact that my Prius must run the motor for a few minutes, wasting gas, in order to warm up the catalytic converter. Thus, if I am taking a 5 minute drive down the street. I have to emit extra pollutants thanks to environmental regulations. Our government should have made an exception to having to have the catalytic converter warmed up, and allowed for a gradual warming.

Just stupidity....worse, we elected this stupidity.

Guess that makes us (Americans) stupid!

Re:Why should ANY of them get an HOV lane pass?

[KevinIsOwn]

Of course, if the government managed it, it wouldn't work.

So let me get this straight; You think that the government could never organize something like Slug Lanes, and yet the government is the one who set up the HOV lane on the highway in the first place. The government is instrumental in the smooth functioning of slug lanes!

You should consider taking a step back from your anti-government ideology and realize that just like any large organization, sometimes things are done right and sometimes they are done wrong. Government is no different from any other large bureaucracy.