Green stickered PlugIns are gonna ri$e...

It's really easy to promote purchasing fuel efficient vehicles. The rest of the world is already doing this. Double or triple the cost of gasoline and everyone will be lining up to buy EV's and hybrids. But it is political suicide and no one will vote for your tax. So as inefficient as the HOV decals are or even how unethical it is, it's the best we have. If you don't agree, let's discuss an alternative that works. I am one data point of someone who would not have purchased if not for the decal.

There were 85k yellow stickers plus a handful of white stickers during the last program. I doubt we're anywhere near 10k white stickers now so I think the decals are will be fine for the rest of the duration.


iPhone ?

 

...hmm...well it seems to me that CA will simply issue more green stickers soon. Otherwise the whole PHEV market would semi-crash.

I wonder if it is better to dis-allow dealerships from automatically handing out stickers...if the individual has to apply, it means they actually need/want it. I wonder if the recent sell-out of green stickers is due to people actually needing more green stickers, or just due to dealers making sure each PHEV gets a green sticker whether or not the owner needs it or not.

 

I would say that it is likely that more stickers are offered as the auto industry has an incentive to lobby for them, politicians have an incentive to give the facade of being environmentally friendly, and the consumers want them. The only people that don't want more stickers are the ones that already have them, and possibly the highway administration.

My whole point is that electric technology doesn't need subsidy to get off the ground and thrive on its own. Rather, it needs gas to become more expensive. If BEVs are better, then consumers will purchase them. No manipulation necessary.

 

Strange as it seems, I've seen a couple of posts by CA plug-in owners who didn't apply for stickers. I can tell you that the issue rate was about 40 a day steady last year until September, when the dealer program started,. September-October it was 90 a day (the pipeline getting filled) and then 80 - 83 a day for the next two 2 month periods, until it spiked in early March.

So my theory is that dealers plus individuals were applying for stickers for more cars after September than individuals were before. But it's also possible that dealers were slowly climbing on the program until March 1 so the increase was just the pipeline filling.

I think longer. A lot of those stickers will go to individuals who would otherwise have applied on their own. So after the dealers finish getting theirs, the issuance rate should drop dramatically. I'm thinking somewhere around mid-May, possibly even longer.