Province unaware of charging stations

I was surprised to read that the province’s climate change plan includes provisions for an Island-wide electric vehicle charging network. Could it really be that the drafters of this plan don’t even know that P.E.I. has had a charging infrastructure in place for about five years? No thanks to the government, we have 26 charging stations strategically located across the Island. Stations were offered free to the provincial and city administrations by Sun Country Highway, but except for Summerside, they were “not interested”.

The real need is for appropriate incentives for the purchase of the vehicles themselves. As an example, Chevy has an all-electric car (the Bolt) with a real-world range of about 400 km, priced at about $42,000. EVs will save at least $2,500 in gas costs alone over a normal driving year of 40,000 km, so in five years that savings, along with no oil changes, filters, spark plugs, coolant, brake pads, etc. drops the cost of the car to less than $25,000. Since the 15 per cent sales tax is levied on the up-front cost, however, that $6,300 is very hard to handle for many people. If that were rebated it would make an EV purchase very attractive. In addition, for at least a few years those rebates would be far less than the province has spent on repeated greenwashing consultant studies. How often do we have a chance to do something both meaningful and cheap?

Harry Smith, Bonshaw