Purchase aids that (finally) target the “right” vehicles for the “right” people. This is essentially what France Strategy, an independent institution that advises Matignon, says in an analysis note entitled “Electric car: at what price?”
Aids that are currently ineffective?
His observation: electric car sales only represented 10% of the new market in 2021 (and almost 13% since the beginning of 2022) when they should represent 100% of sales in 2035. Indeed, Europe has banned the sale of thermal cars. including hybrids, before this deadline. A “zero emissions” sales level that, therefore, remains too low, despite the fact that these vehicles receive very significant public aid, via mechanisms such as the ecological bonus (7,000 euros last year, 6,000 euros in 2022). or the conversion premium.
“Current aid for the purchase of an electric vehicle represents a high cost per ton of carbon avoided,” summarize the authors of the note on the French Strategy, with a series of recommendations such as “a more precise targeting of the ecological bonus, in particular by restricting it to small electric vehicles”.
Currently, the green bonus, a national system with no income conditions, is limited only by the purchase cost of the vehicle. For a 100% electric car, there is currently a cap of 47,000 euros to benefit from the maximum aid of 6,000 euros. Above this price and up to 60,000 euros, the subsidy drops to 2,000 euros.
Not-So-Great ‘Assisted’ Electric Vehicles
Therefore, this aid does not take into account the weight or size of the vehicle. However, since the beginning of the year, we have found rather “small” electric vehicles in the best electric car sales in France, in particular with the leading trio Peugeot e-208, Renault Mégane E-Tech and Fiat 500, more than a single one third of sales. If we go up the ranking, we don’t really find “big” vehicles: the Model 3, fourth, is still a compact saloon and the Peugeot e-2008, sixth, a small SUV.
Only the Tesla Model Y (4.75 meters and almost 2 tons) could fit into the “large vehicle” category, but it only ranks 11th in the ranking of electric sales and only the Propulsion version, which starts at 49,990 euros, you are still eligible. for the bonus reduced to 2,000 euros.
These vehicles are no less expensive, especially when compared to their thermal equivalents. This is underlined in the France Strategy note with several examples, even if this additional cost can be partly offset by aid, resale price and lower cost of use.
For a vehicle in segment B (Peugeot 208/Renault Clio/Zoé); therefore, the additional cost is estimated at 16,000 euros. But your buyer will be able to benefit from 8,800 euros in aid (bonus, conversion premium, local aid, etc.), resell it for 4,500 euros more than the thermal equivalent after six years (you can still find the additional cost in the purchase at resale) and save 1,200 euros in use per year.
Redirect aid to those who really need it
There remains the problem of the initial cost of purchasing an electric car, which is still impossible to assume for the most modest households. A point also raised by the latest report from the Réseau Action Climat, which recommended more specific aid for those French people who really need a subsidy to switch to electricity, with 13.3 million people “who are today in a situation of mobility precarious”.
Among its 19 proposals for the implementation of “a true mobility strategy” in France, the association mentions in particular several paths, such as a redesigned conversion voucher to improve “its social and environmental efficiency”. The following table allows you to quickly see this movement towards the increase in aid to the most modest (the bonus for households with a tax reference unit income of less than 14,000 euros would increase, for example, to 8,000 euros, compared to 2,500 to 5,000 current euros) and an abolition of subsidies for the richest.
Regarding the ecological bonus, the association proposes a much lower ceiling than the current one by granting this aid only for cars of less than 30,000 euros “in order to encourage the purchase of lighter electric vehicles and therefore less expensive.”
If the rest to be paid after the aid is still too high, the Climate Action Network proposes the establishment of a zero-rate loan and a “social leasing” intended only for electric cars.
What to add to the recommendation of France Strategy to establish “specific support for low-income households, especially positioned in the second-hand market where electricity supply is limited (for example through leasing formulas)”. We are also awaiting the details of the “100-euro lease” that should be launched next year, a campaign promise by Emmanuel Macron.
Increase weight penalty, including electric.
France Strategy and the Climate Action Network also agree on the financing of this public aid, which would mean, in particular, a reinforcement of the auto malus. A surcharge that should also discourage people from resorting to the most polluting vehicles and, therefore, also limit CO2 emissions in passing: a basis of the bonus-malus system since its implementation in 2007.
The institution that whispers in Matignon’s ear thus wants “a tightening of the penalty on emissions and weight, in particular for the latter its extension to electric vehicles.”
This measure “could have co-benefits in air pollution, larger vehicles emit more air pollutants than small vehicles and require more resources,” continues the France Strategy note. The opportunity to remember that electric vehicles, “due to greater weight” can finally emit “as many primary particles (braking systems, tires, road) in mass as their thermal counterparts”.
An aspect that addresses the draft of the Euro 7 standard, presented on November 10 and that for the first time must take into account the particle emissions generated by brakes and tires, including electric cars, in the European anti-pollution strategy.
The Climate Action Network, for its part, would like to strongly reinforce a weight penalty, implemented in France since the beginning of 2022, but affecting only some models. “The threshold of 1,800 kg of penalty by weight adopted in the 2021 Finance Law seems very insufficient to me because it only covers 2.6% of vehicle sales” while a threshold of 1,300 kg without excluding electric and rechargeable hybrids would affect “40% of thermal vehicles and 18% of electric ones”, sums up the association.
Source: BFM TV
