# Will governments start taxing EV charging at home?



## styleruk (Dec 3, 2018)

AutopilotFan said:


> I charge at home -- in a condo, using a regular 110v outlet. I don't think you need a 220v line unless your regular daily commute is over 50 miles per day and you can't charge at work. Well, if you have an EV with 300+ miles of range.
> 
> So cost is not an issue for most EV owners if they can charge at home while they sleep. Who cares if it takes 2 hours or 10 hours when you're going to be parked at home for 14 hours most nights?


An interesting thing that could be happening soon in the UK. I've had EVs for 7 years now and have always charged at home and work. I'm lucky as I have fitted solar panels and now getting a battery fitted to the house, but, I've watched closely as the country has been changing to smart meters and I have not for a couple of reasons. 
a) my house is a very old house, the meter is also old and it would cost the supplier a bit of money to fit the new one, so I'm waiting. 
b) I've been following reports and studies around how the smart meters send back information on what is being charged and looking at taxing that electric.

So, in the UK, the tax on petrol or diesel is huge. As more people convert to electric, the gov has a problem here to fill that hole. The money is not used on the roads, mostly it's used for other things, so years ago they started looking at methods to get that back. One is to tax per mile, a fairer option in my opinion. Another is to watch what's being charged and where electric is around 15pence per kWh, they could up that to 50pence per kWh and they have a solution. Charging at work would change, charging at the lovely tesla super chargers would change and charging at home would too...unless you have a battery maybe.
The gov are going to fine suppliers next year if people don't have a smart meter...wonder why? They advertise it as an easier to understand way of how much you are using when it shows on an app on your phone as how many £s you are spending as opposed to how many pounds you pay into the supplier each month....duh! Personally I have always understood how much I've paid per month and don't need an app to tell me any different, most people are not that thick.

So to get back to your 110v outlet at home....that may change. I've chatted about this on other forums, thankfully, it seems there are more intelligent people on this one so I'll say this next thing in the hope that most will get it. Even if you don't have a smart meter, they will still know when you charge an EV, the pattern is massively different and for 99.99% of people, when you start up at 3kW charger that runs overnight, it has a pattern that will be detected by the supplier who will know you are charging an EV. If you buy a battery (static), that is registered, so they know when you are charging a battery and in any case, they don't normally charge the same as a car.

So be careful, the US government might be thinking of ways to capture your charging costs....that said, I don't think your government rely on fuel tax quite as much as we do, but still a big hole to fill.

PS: Since using electric, my fuel bill went from approx. £250 per month to £0. In fact, because of the solar panels, I get paid 4pence per kWh for actually using it (too complicated to explain here but trust me, that's how it works). So if I pump 7kWh into my car, I get paid 28pence. I had spreadsheets running 7 years ago looking at this and my fuel bill back then went from £250 to -£20 ish. In fact, octopus energy (100% green) here in the UK, pay us when the renewables they use kick out too much power, that way, the network charges cars and batteries overnight leaving plenty of energy for everyone else. So my batteries will charge over night when it's 0pence and sometimes as low as -8pence. The gov will have to find this money lost somehow.

Sorry for long post. I'm an engineer and it's interesting.:thumbsup:


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## JasonF (Oct 26, 2018)

styleruk said:


> So be careful, the US government might be thinking of ways to capture your charging costs....that said, I don't think your government rely on fuel tax quite as much as we do, but still a big hole to fill.


That's not going to be easy, since EV's charge normally at a power usage similar to an electric dryer or electric range at 220 volts, or a tea kettle or hair dryer at 120 volts.

Electric usage is already taxed in, I think, pretty much every area of the U.S. - the issue isn't that EV charging is not taxed, but that the money isn't making it to road maintenance because the tax laws are out of date. The states/feds are going to have to figure out how to reallocate road tax money so some of it comes from electric usage, and they're going to have to keep it up yearly so it remains commesurate with how many EV's are being sold.

At least that's the smart way to do it. Unfortunately with lobbying from the oil industry and dealer associations, it's being done more like punishment in the name of "fairness" - since EV owners aren't using the same fuel as "everyone else" states are making EV owners pre-pay the gasoline tax as part of their yearly registration.


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## Klaus-rf (Mar 6, 2019)

JasonF said:


> That's not going to be easy, since EV's charge normally at a power usage similar to an electric dryer or electric range at 220 volts, or a tea kettle or hair dryer at 120 volts.


 Clothes dryers (electric ones - 240VAC load) usually run for 20-30 minutes, then switch off for five or so minutes, then repeat for a few hours - I can't think of any [residential] that run continuously. I also don't know anyone that runs their hair dryer for 10 hours straight (a 120VAC load).


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## JasonF (Oct 26, 2018)

Klaus-rf said:


> Clothes dryers (electric ones - 240VAC load) usually run for 20-30 minutes, then switch off for five or so minutes, then repeat for a few hours - I can't think of any [residential] that run continuously. I also don't know anyone that runs their hair dryer for 10 hours straight (a 120VAC load).


If you're not driving a lot the car could take only 30 min to an hour to charge, which is about the same as running the dryer or electric oven. And a portable heater or window A/C unit will run on 120 volts for several hours straight.


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## Chestnut Mare (Dec 12, 2019)

Klaus-rf said:


> Clothes dryers (electric ones - 240VAC load) usually run for 20-30 minutes, then switch off for five or so minutes, then repeat for a few hours - I can't think of any [residential] that run continuously. I also don't know anyone that runs their hair dryer for 10 hours straight (a 120VAC load).


I have a ground-source heat pump. It can (and does) run continually, if it's really hot or really cold, at about 20 -25 amps at 240 volt. That looks like you are charging, but not so.
I also have a heat pump on my pool, which runs at night, for several hours (but only from May -September). 20 amps/240 volt.
I have a smart meter installed and am on time of use rates.


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## AutopilotFan (Oct 6, 2018)

JasonF said:


> If you're not driving a lot the car could take only 30 min to an hour to charge, which is about the same as running the dryer or electric oven. And a portable heater or window A/C unit will run on 120 volts for several hours straight.


They *might* have something there... even if I've only driven 10 miles the car will take a couple hours to charge. But they won't be able to tell it from the load a portable heater or window AC might use.

In the USA some areas have time of day pricing, where the electricity is cheaper at night when people are sleeping. That's what the timed start for charging is for; to take advantage of that. I've used it sometimes to try and get my car to finish charging just before I leave for work so that the battery is toasty warm in the winter.


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## styleruk (Dec 3, 2018)

JasonF said:


> That's not going to be easy, since EV's charge normally at a power usage similar to an electric dryer or electric range at 220 volts, or a tea kettle or hair dryer at 120 volts.
> 
> Electric usage is already taxed in, I think, pretty much every area of the U.S. - the issue isn't that EV charging is not taxed, but that the money isn't making it to road maintenance because the tax laws are out of date. The states/feds are going to have to figure out how to reallocate road tax money so some of it comes from electric usage, and they're going to have to keep it up yearly so it remains commesurate with how many EV's are being sold.
> 
> At least that's the smart way to do it. Unfortunately with lobbying from the oil industry and dealer associations, it's being done more like punishment in the name of "fairness" - since EV owners aren't using the same fuel as "everyone else" states are making EV owners pre-pay the gasoline tax as part of their yearly registration.


This is a common thought that a clothes dryer or kettle uses the same power, but it does not. We are talking about patterns here, if plotted into the right software, be it a spreadsheet or minitab, you can pick out what's going on really easy. Imagine a daily usage over time, a model which the government clever people know well, when you click a kettle on it spikes above your normal usage for a period of time, sure, if you plug your car in for 3mins, then unplug it...then plug it in again in an hour for a few mins....etc. you will replicate that, but nobody will do that. A clothes dryer is similar, here in uk it's 3kW and might run for 90mins, not constantly 3kW because that's too much of a strain, but roughly it could...again, only 90mins at 3kW is nothing for a car. Being an engineer I have explained this many times and the only example I give that makes sense is the time I had dinner on the 101 tower in Taiwan. It sways and has a massive counter balance set from half way up that keeps it from swaying too much, I took a device to dinner with me that detects movement to a laboratory level. It recorded footsteps, bumps, gusts of wind...everything. But putting the data into mini tab I could clearly see a pattern and extract how much it swayed by even though the data contained all sorts of noise.
It's the same with electric usage. the electric suppliers have been able to do this for a very long time. And besides, when everyone has smart meters that report back what's what, it'll be very easy to tell when an EV is plugged in. Looking forward into the future, they will cross reference where the car is etc... It's bound to happen and is the price we pay for such cool tech.
Regarding electric already being taxed, you are right and it's the same here in UK. But this will be a tax on top of that purely for EVs.
My battery in my house has to be registered with the gov when fitted, even if you buy your own, the supplier has to have that information and it has to be registered when fitted into an existing system. Sure there are ways around it but the gov don't care about the 0.0001% of people who cheat the system, they want to catch the rest. So eventually, I will see some kind of intervention into my battery charging too, but I'm not sure how they'll do that yet.
As for the issue of the money not making it to the road, well, yes. But then tax on cigs don't make it back to saving lives of people who smoke either. The gov in the UK get a **** load of money from motorists, this will have to be replaced and it's the motorists who will be hit. We still have crap roads and potholes like everyone else, but we also have shiny new warships! 
Here in the UK, we also have a road tax. Another stealth tax that they hit motorists with, EVs are free at the moment (watch that space), but I pay £90 for my BMW motorbike, £270 for my motorhome (RV), and nothing for my tesla, classic car or electric motorbike. When I started driving, they were talking about putting the road tax onto fuel, which makes perfect sense because the more miles you do, the more you pay right? Well, turns out, they already did that many years ago and added the road tax anyway! FFS! 
So there is no way of getting out of the financial deficit apart from stinging the car drivers. Enjoy the cheap motoring while you can, I've added solar panels and a battery to my house for a reason. 50% environment 50% future cost cutting.

Sorry for long post, missing the regular alcohol induced pub banter during this 2nd, 3rd...etc lock down.


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## JasonF (Oct 26, 2018)

styleruk said:


> Looking forward into the future, they will cross reference where the car is etc... It's bound to happen and is the price we pay for such cool tech.


The issue though is you're talking about statistics of probability. If there's this pattern, it's _probably_ an EV charging. The trouble with that is, when taxes are concerned, they have to be _certain_. Otherwise they have news programs featuring some old couple with no car whatsoever that has an electric bill with rated road taxes on it because statistically, they live in an area with a lot of EV's and their patterns show they've been charging one. Maybe they just get cold and don't want to run the furnace at night, so they use a portable heater.



styleruk said:


> Regarding electric already being taxed, you are right and it's the same here in UK. But this will be a tax on top of that purely for EVs.


When electric becomes more multipurpose (such as in the case of EV's) the lawmakers really should think of the taxes on it as "intrastructure taxes" rather than simply taxes on electric separate from road taxes. It can pay for both roads and new electric infrastructure.



styleruk said:


> My battery in my house has to be registered with the gov when fitted, even if you buy your own, the supplier has to have that information and it has to be registered when fitted into an existing system.


I don't know if they tax batteries in the UK, but in the U.S. those have to be registered and insured in case they backfeed during a power outage.


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## Ed Woodrick (May 26, 2018)

Many states in the US have already found a way, They charge at yearly car registration times. Right now the numbers range from about $100-$300 per year. It's more than petrol charges, but not a huge amount in the whole scheme of things.


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## AutopilotFan (Oct 6, 2018)

@styleruk , the USA does a lot less to try to determine what individuals are doing. I'm imagining something I saw about vans driving around in London trying to determine if folks have a TV but weren't paying the TV tax -- folks in the USA don't even *think *about making rules that are enforced in that way.

I'm not denying that someone might try. I think they won't attempt it in the USA. I pay an excise tax every year because I have registered a vehicle, and the taxes are much higher for EVs than for ICE cars.


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## styleruk (Dec 3, 2018)

It is the case that the USA do not tax or watch things in the same way as the UK. Regarding JasonF comment regarding people accidently getting taxed on their fuel bill, this happens now anyway and there will always be a very small % of people getting caught this way. In the UK, when you buy an EV, you get a discount and the gov immediately know you have an EV, you also register the car with DVLA which is a gov run department who know exactly what car you have. Even if you buy it second hand, if you legally drive it on the road, then the gov know. It is unlikely an old couple who don't own an EV (bit ageist), would be charged because if they don't have an EV, then they won't be on that list. If they do have an EV and use their bar heater a lot, there is a small chance they will get caught by a higher tax and I suppose it'll be an immediate call to the supplier to contest it, which happens all the time anyway. Generally though, the gov will get 99% of people and that's what they need. Of course you can circumnavigate it, just like you can circumnavigate things now. My charger can charge at 4kW, but I rarely have it that high. Normally I plug in if it's daylight and use the power from the solar panels. But I'm lucky in that a) I can do that and b) I charge at work most of the time, so maybe that will change in time as the company might get charged tax on cars charged there somehow...not as easy to track because most factories have 3phase and use way more than a 7kW car charger uses. That said, to get a charge point fitted, it has to be registered...guess where? And so it goes on, the ever difficult subject of tax...curse the Romans.

That said, in the USA (which is the majority of this forum), it might not be the case and the gov will not know who is charging an EV. The US is less likely to monitor usage I suppose, so owning an EV in the US is much better than Europe in that respect. But then you've had cheap fuel for years anyway.

PS
_My great-great grandad was a fantastic man, built the school I went to for free and gave it to the church, who more recently sold it to private housing . But he lived in a small house in my village which I ended up living in. When he was younger the first electric lamp post was fitted outside his house on the road. He immediately dug a trench to it and powered house lights from it! My uncle who lived with him when he was young moved to a flat (apartment), with some friends when he was older and they had a pay meter for electric, like most did them days (1970s). He used to cast 50 pence pieces out of ice and use them in the meter! There were talks of people using magnets on the bottom of meters to slow them down. 
So people find a way round this and they will find a way round paying this tax if it happens._


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## JasonF (Oct 26, 2018)

styleruk said:


> In the UK, when you buy an EV, you get a discount and the gov immediately know you have an EV, you also register the car with DVLA which is a gov run department who know exactly what car you have.


That assumes different government branches will actually talk to each other, which _never actually happens_.


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## styleruk (Dec 3, 2018)

JasonF said:


> That assumes different government branches will actually talk to each other, which _never actually happens_.


That may be the case in your country but here they most definitely do talk to each other, especially when it's tax related. If you want to make a tax claim against the gov for something you've overpaid, well that's a different story


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## Garlan Garner (May 24, 2016)

The govt will NOT be able to tax at home via electricity usage.

1. I have FUSC....they can't prove I charge at home.
2. Not everyone lives at a home. 
3. There is no way to distinguish charging a Tesla from drying clothes.
4. I don't charge at home - I use the free charge point at my job.
5. etc.

The simplest way is to charge during "license plate registration".


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## styleruk (Dec 3, 2018)

Garlan Garner said:


> The govt will NOT be able to tax at home via electricity usage.
> 
> 1. I have FUSC....they can't prove I charge at home.
> 2. Not everyone lives at a home.
> ...


All of this is in discussion and not implemented yet.
I'm sure there are different rules in different countries and of course there will be people who slip through the net. Also, there are other ways it can be done. I was saying, in UK they have been studying and even readying this for many years now. But they are still talking about tax per mile, which may win over. Regarding tax at registration...oh we get that now anyway. I paid £47,000 for my model three in June 2019 (first ones here). VAT was £8,000, then I had to pay a luxury tax because the cost of the car was over £40,000! so another £850. Thankfully, the gov were giving £3500 because it was an EV, but that is being reduced slowly.
2. No, they don't but they have to register it somewhere. And if it's plugged into a smart meter, that place could get taxed.
3. They can, this has been proved. Even if they don't detect by use of smart meter, they can if they want to by simple data models, unless you run your dryer flat out all night regular that is. In which case your electric bill will be huge anyway.
4. so do I, but one day work will be charged, so they either take the costs or pass it on to the user.

As I said, there are ways around it, and this may not be the way the gov decide to reclaim lost taxes in the future. This is still early days, in the UK it's about 1% of people using EVs, but the gov has set a 2030 date for no more petrol or diesel cars to be sold new. By then most will be in EVs, so they won't sit on their hands knowing they will lost £40 billion from the motorists. Currently several methods:

1) detect when car is being charged and apply a different tax. It has been studied and is not the best option they have, there will still be ways of getting around it.
2) tax per mile. car mileage is known when you have to get a yearly check and that is all connected to the gov.
3) your car just grasses you up. It'll be registered anyway, connected anyway, you'll have some kind of app anyway, and your four-wheeled friend will know precisely how many juices you've poured into it. It doesn't matter where that came from. It'll spill the beans and the tax can be easily applied at a flat, fair rate. All of the hardware for this is already inside pretty much every electric car. This will not be so good for the like of me and you, because we charge at work.
4) car monitoring, not gonna happen. This is happening in other countries but the cost of adding cameras everywhere will cost the gov too much.

So, in UK, £40billion does not sound like a lot, but they won't lose it and EV takeup could be ~12% per year here. For the last 7years I've been lucky and paid nearly 0 for my fuel, I know that will end eventually. But for the USA, I'm sure it's a different story and you probably are right, your gov will never tax your EV usage, maybe it's not such a big deficit in the USA, your fuel is cheap anyway.

PS; before I got my first EV 7 years ago, I used to make my own bio diesel. I knew someone who owned a cafe and they gave me their old oil, I filtered and processed it (long story that one), and used bio diesel for about 5 years. Costs were 10% of what the pump charged and several weekends a year of my time. Before that, approx. 20yrs ago, I had LPG fitted to both my cars, then it was 20% of cost of normal fuel, now it's around 50% and the pumps are dissapearing.
Now I have solar panels and a battery in my house and can charge my car and moped with very little effort and cost to me and the environment. Living the dream.
Until the gov stick their big tax foot in....then I'm going to research teleporting or simply work from home and use my bicycle more.  Stay safe.


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## AmokTime (Mar 15, 2020)

US owner here. States are adopting fixed add-on fees to annual vehicle registration for EVs. I’m in PA, which doesn’t have this yet. I’m required to have a separate meter for charging and submit monthly payments. That ends in 2021. Our state HoR just passed a $175/yr fee on EVs to replace lost fuel tax revenue and the bill is expected to pass the state senate and be signed into law in short order. It’s a bad deal for me because I don’t drive much. People who drive a lot make out like bandits.


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## AmokTime (Mar 15, 2020)

I should mention that PA has the second-highest fuel tax in the US at US$0.771/gallon (CA just passed us at $0.822). Yet other states have higher EV registration fees. Illinois recently proposed legislation to raise their EV fee to $1000/year, but that was defeated and ended up being more reasonable at $251/year. In the US we are already stumbling from the “fuel tax replacement” to “exploitive EV taxation” phase, despite being too early in adoption for that. Once one state does it the others are sure to follow, just like speed cameras.


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## JasonF (Oct 26, 2018)

I must chime in and bring up the point that these yearly fees are not actually taxing EV’s for missing gas tax revenue. They are purely pushed by lobby groups from oil companies, and shamefully, from other manufacturers and dealer association groups. They are intended to be punitive, and reflects only that these groups likely initially pushed to prevent purchase and/or registration of EV’s entirely, but had to compromise when they couldn’t get that through.

Try and calculate how much gas tax that actually would be. In most states with these fees, they charge for as much “missing fuel tax” as if you were driving a Chevy Suburban that gets 6 mpg. Why not a Toyota Corolla? The answer is because the message they’re trying to send is that if you intended to save on fuel costs by getting an EV, they are going to make sure you pay them anyway, so you may as well just buy a gas car.

I saw an Lehto’s Law video explaining why states (like Michigan in his case) want to stop EV’s from being sold, and it made a lot more sense than a simple hatred toward EV’s. It’s that the “traditional” manufacturers see Tesla and EV’s as a threat, and they see the encroaching EV trend. They know that in some cases they have a year or two years of catching up to do to produce EV’s of their own. So what they want to do is curb sales from Tesla, make buying EV’s difficult long enough to get EV’s of their own in front of customers.


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## AmokTime (Mar 15, 2020)

Granted, these fees are being pushed by Big Oil and by traditional car manufacturers and dealers to delay EV adoption, and that’s why we are seeing the big EV fees being pushed by Republican legislators. They have to give a justification to avoid being called out, though, and the justification they give is that they are replacing gas tax revenue for road repair (though, in the US, EVs are still only a few percent of the market). ICE drivers support these fees because (1) it doesn’t affect them and (2) they don’t want to see what they perceive as wealthy EV drivers avoiding taxation that everyone else has to pay. I don’t know what Illinois was using as justification for $1000/year. I’m all for everyone paying their reasonable share toward maintaining infrastructure, but I have the feeling that, like every other inroad to taxation, this is just getting their foot in the door to prepare for future abuse.


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## styleruk (Dec 3, 2018)

Wow, enter 'sarcastic mode'. $0.77 a gallon (US gallon), you pay waaaay too much, you poor bastards! 
In the UK we pay £1.10 per litre and £270 per year other tax depending on vehicle. If you have a big car....like a range rover (US compact), it goes up massively. Motorists over here get absolutely fleeced with tax, which is why the car share/rent type approach will win here in time. By the time you buy a car, add insurance, tax, £40k+ car (like my tesla), tax then they'll add tax on the EV eventually when our gov finds out we can't buy a new shiny war ship because the motorists are paying less.....etc.
I have a motorhome with a Mercedes diesel engine, a BMW motorbike, model 3 and a 1965 singer gazelle. The classic is by far the cheapest to run and I used to commute that old girl, so I know. Actually, I do have an electric scooter, that is probably the cheapest to run and a lot of fun too.

So forgive me if I am not surprised that you might pay a levy on EVs in the future. It has to happen someway.
As for the big players driving these costs, we don't get that feeling over here.


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## GDN (Oct 30, 2017)

The road tax is another one that likely just needs to be overhauled. Drop the collection at the pump and add a flat tax for each vehicle at registration time. I know that won't be fair either to many, but it is the way you do business and keep the collections up anyway. Many states and the Fed gov't have short falls for their road projects, so make it a flat fee and bring in a little more revenue fairly based across all vehicles, not more for an EV like some states are pushing (looking at you TX). Years like 2020 when the number of miles driven drop off sharply due to a pandemic should help force issues like this.


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## JasonF (Oct 26, 2018)

AmokTime said:


> Granted, these fees are being pushed by Big Oil and by traditional car manufacturers and dealers to delay EV adoption, and that's why we are seeing the big EV fees being pushed by Republican legislators


I will caution everyone that this is not something that occurs along political lines; It's politicians that are beholden to oil companies, traditional car manufacturers, and dealer associations. It even happens in "blue" states. I'm cautioning on this because don't think for a minute that voting in all Democrats will get rid of the problem. Changing the political makeup of your state government will only lead to disappointment. The root problem is there is a lot of money behind it, and all of our lawmakers are for sale.

If you want evidence of that, look no further than Michigan, which seeks to ban Tesla from selling cars in the state altogether, makes building charging stations difficult, and makes registering EV's difficult and expensive. And I believe California still requires EV owners to purchase extra stickers (more than one!) and apply them to the car.


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## Feathermerchant (Sep 17, 2018)

I'm going to say that no one knows how much ($) road tax they pay annually through the gasoline tax.
In Texas it's 20¢ state and 18.4¢ federal. So if I drive my 25mpg car 12,000 miles that's 12000/25=480 gallons.
$96 to Texas and $88.32 to the feds. $184.32 total
I wonder how much of that goes toward emissions testing.

So editing - I calculated about 1.5¢/mile paid in taxes with the assumptions above. We in Texas report odometer mileage every year at inspection and those inspections are spread out over all 12 months for the cars registered in Tx so paying at inspection time would be a fair way to pay road taxes. Of course during these pandemic times and times of slow economy people drive less and so the revenue would go down. But that happens now with the gas tax.


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## styleruk (Dec 3, 2018)

JasonF said:


> The issue though is you're talking about statistics of probability. If there's this pattern, it's _probably_ an EV charging. The trouble with that is, when taxes are concerned, they have to be _certain_. Otherwise they have news programs featuring some old couple with no car whatsoever that has an electric bill with rated road taxes on it because statistically, they live in an area with a lot of EV's and their patterns show they've been charging one. Maybe they just get cold and don't want to run the furnace at night, so they use a portable heater.
> 
> When electric becomes more multipurpose (such as in the case of EV's) the lawmakers really should think of the taxes on it as "intrastructure taxes" rather than simply taxes on electric separate from road taxes. It can pay for both roads and new electric infrastructure.
> 
> I don't know if they tax batteries in the UK, but in the U.S. those have to be registered and insured in case they backfeed during a power outage.


Yes, indeed. And we get that now, but the numbers will be low. I'm not saying this is the way it will go (in UK), but it is an option they are looking at and in any case. There's 2 points to be made here.
1) The old couple that don't have an EV will not have registered with the gov so they won't charge them anyway.
2) it is unlikely that they would have anything that shows a pattern of a car charging, I struggle to explain this point. It is something I have done for 3 decades. The pattern of a car charging is very easy to detect, I don't care if you plug in your 3kW heater for 6 hrs, I will still know you are charging a car. Maybe a pool heater might act similar, but that should be registered too...if not, then that's your lookout. Maybe there is less control in the USA, I can't comment on that, but the gov here in the UK knows these things and of course people slip through the net and there are red top paper headlines that read these stories now and then, this is all normall.

Regarding taxes, again, may be a UK thing. But we are taxed heavily as car users, very heavy. £1.20 per litre of fuel, silly high yearly road tax if you have a bigger car, £40k plus cars tax at purchase and for first 3 years (£800 + per year), VAT on buying the sodding car in the first place (that cost me £8k), If what we pay went towards the roads they would be gold plated. But we have the NHS, so can't complain too much. we are expecting some kind of new tax to replace the massive loss in fuel tax in the future. If planes paid as much tax as cars do, it would probably cost £100,000 to fly to USA. Motorists are very unfairly treated over here, but we are British and just moan up the pub (can't do that at the moment so I'm on here moaning, bloody lock down)


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## styleruk (Dec 3, 2018)

JasonF said:


> I will caution everyone that this is not something that occurs along political lines; It's politicians that are beholden to oil companies, traditional car manufacturers, and dealer associations. It even happens in "blue" states. I'm cautioning on this because don't think for a minute that voting in all Democrats will get rid of the problem. Changing the political makeup of your state government will only lead to disappointment. The root problem is there is a lot of money behind it, and all of our lawmakers are for sale.
> 
> If you want evidence of that, look no further than Michigan, which seeks to ban Tesla from selling cars in the state altogether, makes building charging stations difficult, and makes registering EV's difficult and expensive. And I believe California still requires EV owners to purchase extra stickers (more than one!) and apply them to the car.


Wow, stickers! that's archaic. If people want change, it will happen. However, humans often don't like change do they. I imagine it was similar when henry ford knocked out the car that average people could afford, horse prices dropped and other shenanigans happened that are similar. I know a guy in our office who has bleated on for the 8years I've had electric cars as to how **** they are and the infrastructure won't be in place, not fair for people who can't charge at their house, the range is not 700miles, etc...etc.... I have to yawn loudly when he starts up. He owns a very cheap car that does the job and he's now looking at the next one to be an EV version. Hates the fact that I charge up at work for free and he still has to pay £250 per month in fuel costs. Jealousy is a horrible thing. People don't like change. They have to be dragged kicking and screaming into the future, unfortunately, some of them are politicians and some of them are politicians who are scarred of these people.


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## JasonF (Oct 26, 2018)

styleruk said:


> 1) The old couple that don't have an EV will not have registered with the gov so they won't charge them anyway.


Or the government might assume that they have an unregistered EV, because so many people figured that out as a loophole - register your EV at someone else's address so they don't know you're charging at home. Government tends to fight back against that by using their own metrics and not relying on people registering things correctly. Which is how the old couple gets hit with road taxes.

By the way, EV cars don't constantly charge for 6 hours either. Even before I worked from home, my car charged an average of about 1 hr a night at 7200 watts. That's about the same as running a dryer. So now think about, what if that old couple had been drying their clothes outside, and decided that was inconvenient one day and bought a dryer? The government might assume they have an unregistered EV, and start charging them road tax. An old couple isn't going to think of registering a dryer with the government to make sure they don't know it's not an EV.

And yes, I watch/read Douglas Adams, so I know about the British attitude that if you didn't bother to look up all of the obscure laws and do what you're supposed to do, you deserve to be punished. I know how that differs greatly with the U.S. attitude of "I wasn't properly notified, so it doesn't apply to me".

I also know that the U.K. has more government involvement in managing vehicles. There may even be strict threats of jail time if you don't report that you have an EV or properly report where and when you're charging it. What's silly about all of that is, if they're going to require you to report your charging habits, why not just require reporting mileage instead? That's a better way to compute accurate driving time anyway. Once a year you have an inspection, both for vehicle safety, and also to report how many miles you drove during that year. Then you pay tax based on how much you drove. It's 100% fair, and has no accidental over or under charging, either for EV's or gas vehicles.


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## styleruk (Dec 3, 2018)

JasonF said:


> Or the government might assume that they have an unregistered EV, because so many people figured that out as a loophole - register your EV at someone else's address so they don't know you're charging at home. Government tends to fight back against that by using their own metrics and not relying on people registering things correctly. Which is how the old couple gets hit with road taxes.
> 
> By the way, EV cars don't constantly charge for 6 hours either. Even before I worked from home, my car charged an average of about 1 hr a night at 7200 watts. That's about the same as running a dryer. So now think about, what if that old couple had been drying their clothes outside, and decided that was inconvenient one day and bought a dryer? The government might assume they have an unregistered EV, and start charging them road tax. An old couple isn't going to think of registering a dryer with the government to make sure they don't know it's not an EV.
> 
> ...


Firstly let me point out again that this is one method they are looking at and not the one they are probably going to go with here in the UK, more likely charge per mile.
Secondly, of course, as I say, people will slip through the net. People dodge taxes all the time, there's millions of £s lost in tax dodging and there's also many people getting charged tax for nothing, hell, I got caught out. Last year it turns out I'd not been given the reduction for my pension benefit, it lead to years of claims and equalled to nearly £2,000 rebate, nice, but how many others get charged this and don't claim? There's always going to be the case of the old couple getting charged.

A small thing about patterns;
I'd bet money that given the data of electric usage of 99.9% of houses, I'd be able to minitab out an EV charge. Whatever they use. Of course if they charged a car once or twice it would get through the net, but generally it would show up and that's what the studies that have been done show. Coupled with 99.9% of people registering their car correctly (which they will, because most can't be bothered to dodge it for a few quid) along with having to register your charge point with a small device that links back to the gov (again avoidable by a few if they can be arsed), the system would work....in the UK of course.
Unlikely to be used though. As I say, more likely the pay per mile will come in which is fairer for the general population, not for me with my solar panels and house battery though....bugger!
*note; this thread was moved and misses a bit about the different options the gov have been studying for years. There are so many ways to tax a motorist that sticks to the law as the car, ev charge point etc are all registered to the gov and like sheep we will all pay the tax.
Because UK have announced no new cars to be fossil fuel in 10years, this has made a few more of those options more public and the winner at the moment is tax per mile, which is a shame for the solar brigade. but you can't win them all.


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## JasonF (Oct 26, 2018)

styleruk said:


> A small thing about patterns;
> I'd bet money that given the data of electric usage of 99.9% of houses, I'd be able to minitab out an EV charge. Whatever they use. Of course if they charged a car once or twice it would get through the net, but generally it would show up and that's what the studies that have been done show. Coupled with 99.9% of people registering their car correctly (which they will, because most can't be bothered to dodge it for a few quid) along with having to register your charge point with a small device that links back to the gov (again avoidable by a few if they can be arsed), the system would work....in the UK of course..


Ironically, as far as the UK is concerned, the entire discussion is now moot. I watched a video last night of an EV charge point install at a home done by an electrician - normally boring, but when I saw the video title I watched it, remembering this thread.

And guess what I saw? First, that charge points are required to be installed by licensed electricians in the UK (which means it's harder for a homeowner to legally install it themselves and go under the radar). The homeowner was talented enough that they did a lot of the prep work themselves, but legally couldn't progress past a certain point. But more importantly, that the charge point had special data connection _directly to the electric meter, _and he stated that it was required in the UK. He didn't state what the connection was for, but I'm assuming if it's directly to the meter it could be for monitoring, or for turning off EV charging during high demand, or both.


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## Albert Hillebrand (Dec 16, 2020)

Here in CA with the state and localities running big deficits due to Covid, I am betting they will find a way to jack up utility rates to bring in more bucks. I doubt the federal government will be inclined to bail out all these entities as they too are in a pinch, though of course they run the currency printing presses...


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## styleruk (Dec 3, 2018)

JasonF said:


> Ironically, as far as the UK is concerned, the entire discussion is now moot. I watched a video last night of an EV charge point install at a home done by an electrician - normally boring, but when I saw the video title I watched it, remembering this thread.
> 
> And guess what I saw? First, that charge points are required to be installed by licensed electricians in the UK (which means it's harder for a homeowner to legally install it themselves and go under the radar). The homeowner was talented enough that they did a lot of the prep work themselves, but legally couldn't progress past a certain point. But more importantly, that the charge point had special data connection _directly to the electric meter, _and he stated that it was required in the UK. He didn't state what the connection was for, but I'm assuming if it's directly to the meter it could be for monitoring, or for turning off EV charging during high demand, or both.


I did mention that. The charge point has to be connected to a meter that feeds back to the gov or through a smart meter that does the same. Does not stop you plugging elsewhere but as I say, 99% won't bother trying to circumnavigate it, it's not worth it for most. I know, I've got one and it flashes away reporting what I've used.


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## JasonF (Oct 26, 2018)

styleruk said:


> I did mention that. The charge point has to be connected to a meter that feeds back to the gov or through a smart meter that does the same. Does not stop you plugging elsewhere but as I say, 99% won't bother trying to circumnavigate it, it's not worth it for most. I know, I've got one and it flashes away reporting what I've used.


You might have mentioned it, but until I saw the video, I didn't think you meant _physically connected to the meter via data cable_.

Since it's an actual data connection, it would be really easy to tell if you're cheating and plugging into, say, a wall outlet instead. The electric usage would still be there, but it wouldn't be tracked as EV charging. If there are criminal penalties attached to that, the risk is really high.


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## styleruk (Dec 3, 2018)

JasonF said:


> You might have mentioned it, but until I saw the video, I didn't think you meant _physically connected to the meter via data cable_.
> 
> Since it's an actual data connection, it would be really easy to tell if you're cheating and plugging into, say, a wall outlet instead. The electric usage would still be there, but it wouldn't be tracked as EV charging. If there are criminal penalties attached to that, the risk is really high.


Indeed, a) it's not worth it for most. b) it's not worth worrying the gov about c) they probably will go with the tax per mile thing (which sucks). But with all that said, they could, if they wanted to, find where cars were being charged up by very quickly and relativly easily running the usage data model of each person through an algorithm that spots it....but they probably won't. I work with statistics a lot and know this can be done regardless of what other things you use. But it's academic really.
...and yes, my fuse box is full of stuff. I have:
- my old fashioned electric meter
- fuse box
- solar monitoring meter (which the gov can access)
- house battery fuse box and controller (which the gov can access)
- car charger monitor and fuse box (which the gov can access)
- few other switches and fuses

it's a bit busy in that box and looks like a Christmas tree in the night. Probably consuming 50w of electric in lights and cpus.


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## RickO2018 (Mar 13, 2018)

US government already taxes electricity, so more that is used the more they receive. However, it wouldn’t be surprising if they increase their percentage.


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## Kizzy (Jul 25, 2016)

JasonF said:


> […]
> And I believe California still requires EV owners to purchase extra stickers (more than one!) and apply them to the car.


Just for clarity, California only requires the sticker (decal) purchase if you want to participate in the HOV lane access incentive program (and it's a relatively small one-time fee). I suspect they went with stickers instead of tags because it's a time limited program (up to four years per vehicle) before being phased out entirely.


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