Govt’s electric dreams are romantic
As the developer of the hybrid Prius more than 20 years ago, Toyota has a long history of reducing emissions and continues to support the pathway to a zero emissions world.
Yet a possible consequence of the Climate Change Commission’s draft advice to the Government is the appearance in New Zealand of zeroemitting yet potentially zero-safety-rated electric vehicles in an attempt to make EVs affordable. In the short term, lowemission powertrains, new technology and advanced safety comes at a premium. But it becomes affordable over time.
Because of the proposed ban on internal combustion engine imports, New Zealand could end up with more vehicles on the road, rather than the intended reduction. I see Kiwis opting to own an EV and keeping their utes for business, or SUVs to tow a boat. It could be decades before your average Kiwi, let alone more vulnerable citizens, will be able to afford an EV. We will not have access to thousands of affordable and reliable preowned EVs from Japan for a long time.
The small selection of EVs circulating in the domestic market will carry a significant premium and be difficult for New Zealand importers to purchase. Most Kiwis will continue to drive ageing highemitting cars, or not drive at all due to high carbon taxes on petrol and imported cars. This will place significant pressure on our public transport infrastructure.
There are three key points to conside r on our pathway to low-emitting transport.
The Commission thinks that 40 per cent of our national fleet of light vehicles will be electric by 2035.
We will have a far greater number of EVs on our roads in 2035. But who can say in what proportion?
Your next new car will be a smarter solution. It will be more fuel-efficient. It might well be a hybrid or even an EV.
But the global production of pure EVs and hybrids is still only a fraction of total vehicle manufacturing. Raw materials for batteries are in short supply and global manufacturers will allocate new stock to bigger and closer markets than New Zealand.
Cost is another issue. The cheapest new EV on the market in New Zealand today is about $60,000. We sell the Toyota Corolla hybrid for $33,690. There is no pure EV Corolla on the horizon for that sort of money.
The logical, affordable option will be to buy an imported used hybrid or EV, which is going to present problems for Kiwi drivers and the country.
There is not, and won’t be in the foreseeable future, a massive pool of used EVs in Japan for us or other used importers to buy at the markets and bring to New Zealand. Less than 1 per cent of Japan’s total light vehicle sales last year were EV.
Importers will be forced to look elsewhere to meet local emissions standards. The obvious market will be China, which is making more EVs than the rest of the world put together. Most are left-hand drive, small city cars with potentially zero safety features. So that rules out bringing in used EVs from China.
But there will be a supply of new, and potentially, cheap Chinese-made EVs. But therein lies the problem. Chinese cars are not designed for New Zealand roads and very few, at present, are ANCAP safety tested and rated.
It will come down to a trade-off between driving a well-built, safe and lowemitting car designed for New Zealand roads or an affordable but dangerous oneor no-star rated zero-emissions vehicle.
I would not want my kids driving around this country’s roads in a one-star rated vehicle, electric or not. I support the Ministry of Transport’s view that safer cars save lives — zero-star vehicles should not be sold in New Zealand.
How the country will power all these new EVs is another problem. The country has enough renewable electricity to power more EV cars and trucks. When we get to the Commission’s target, however, it gets expensive. We will have to increase electricity generating and distribution capacity substantially when the EV fleet gets to 15 to 20 per cent of the national fleet.
I support ambition to move to a lowemission economy, and I admire the passion of wanting to move at a brisk pace. However, lots of things will need to happen to get to a decarbonised transport market. There needs to be a realistic transitionary period so we can, affordably, shift to lower emission vehicles.