Show notes
This week on the Electrek Podcast, we discuss the most popular news in the world of sustainable transport and energy, including more Tesla Roadster information, Toyota bringing EVs to the US, a new federal tax credit, and more. The Electrek Podcast is me, Fred Lambert, editor-in-chief of Electrek, and Seth Weintraub, founder and publisher of Electrek and the 9to5 network, discussing all our top stories of the week while taking questions from our readers and highlighting the most insightful comments on the site. The show is back live every Friday at 4 p.m. ET on Electrek’s YouTube channel. As a reminder, we’ll have an accompanying post, like this one, on the site with an embedded link to the live stream. Head to the YouTube channel to get your questions and comments in. After the show ends at around 5 p.m. ET, the video will be archived on YouTube and the audio on all your favorite podcast apps: Apple Podcasts Spotify Overcast Pocket Casts Castro RSS We now have a Patreon if you want to help us to avoid more ads and invest more in our content. We have some awesome gifts for our Patreons and more coming. Here are a few of the articles that we will discuss during the podcast today: Tesla to get access to $7,000 tax credit on 400,000 more electric cars in the US with new incentive reform Elon Musk asked Biden administration to implement a carbon tax Elon Musk is serious about making Tesla Roadster ‘hover’ with rocket technology Elon Musk believes Bill Gates had a big short position on Tesla (TSLA) and lost a lot of money Tesla (TSLA) buys $1.5B in bitcoin, pushing the crypto to all-time high; plans to accept as payment Toyota announces 2 electric cars coming to the US this year Audi unveils 2022 e-tron GT – combining luxury and electric performance Here’s the live stream for today’s episode starting at 4 p.m. ET (or the video after 5 p.m. ET): https://youtu.be/lS4w6cAGtIw Transcription Fred: And we are lively. These are gentlemen for a new episode of the electric podcast. I am Fred Lambert, your hosts, and as usual I'm joined by set Winthrop today. Set [00:00:09] Seth: I'm good. [00:00:10]Fred: All right, let's jump into this. We have a, quite a few interesting news to discuss this week, and we're going to start with one. [00:00:15] That's gonna, it's gonna affect a lot of people that are planning to buy an electric car in the U S sometime this year or even in the next few years. The The long anticipated reform of the federal tax credit for electric vehicles is, is pretty close to happening. So it was officially submitted to the house of representative in Washington. [00:00:40]And it's called, it's called the green act. And green is an acronym for growing renewable energy and efficiency. Now. Now. Cool. All right. There's, there's a bunch of different things to unpack in there. There's it's a, it, it, it, it affects the ITC for solar. It brings it back to 30% and extends it until 20 26. [00:01:02] But of course, the thing that we were more morals interested in is how does it affect the federal tax credit for electric vehicles? Because that's what needed to be reformed specifically, because, I mean, it was really unfair to a Tesla and in GM, right? Warren now don't watch buyers of this NGM don't have access to it. [00:01:20] And and sorry, I don't, I'm going to share the screen here. Sure. Got to do that thing. Quick sharing screen. Boom, we're on. Yeah. So Tesla and GM hit the threshold for the, the $200,000 to 200,000 deliveries in the U S and after that, they, they still managed to get more tasks rather than 200,000. [00:01:44] Then there's a phase out period that lasts more than a year, really. But now it's over for both automakers and basically the situation now is you have. Automakers that have EVs in the market that they're more competitive. Price-wise. Because their buyers have access to the tax credit. And this learned GM buyers don't even though for the only reason that they were sooner to market with higher volume of EVs. [00:02:09] So it doesn't make any sense. It doesn't encourage automakers to, to produce the vehicles. There are a bunch of different things were suggested over the last few years. If you've been following this, the legislation that was proposed around that some people were pushing for. Let's just remove the cap altogether and. [00:02:26] Put a timeline on it. Instead, for example, like seven $7,500 now, and by 2023, it goes down to six and then by 2025 goes down to five. And so on you phase that out until all electric vehicles or competitive with Fossil fuel powered vehicles. But somehow that didn't go, that it was isn't the solution that has been brought forward this time, especially not with this green accurate, instead of what they're proposing is a new cap of 600,000 deliveries, so significant increase But the 200,000 deliveries that happened before are still accounted for. [00:03:04] So it's really 400,000 new potential deliveries that can apply. And I'm at the new count on those 400,000 Appen when the new law is adopted. So this, this is great. Anything also also the change, the, the, the, the change, the actual amount. It's not 7,500 now. It's it's 7,000 pretty, pretty close. But in, in, in the if you read the actual a document here, they do say that the, the new cap is adopted. [00:03:33] The date of enactment are, so those sole on the date of enactment, the student to determine when the 600 officials is reached between the 200,000 and the 600, the 600,000. So. That's all they're going to account for which it's kind of a problem because normally with tax credit, you would think is just if you took delivery in that tax year. [00:03:56]But not now, we we're going to kind of have to wait for this thing to actually be enacted. And that, that means that could, that could create some problem for Tesla in, in GM. For selling cars in between now and when it's going to be enacted, because I think a lot of the people, including herself were assuming that that thing is going to pass. [00:04:15] I don't know. What, what do you think Seth [00:04:17] Seth: yeah. W you know, with the Democrats in all houses and the presidency, you would think so, although some of those tiebreaker type Democrats, like Joe Manchin of West Virginia, May not be so easy to convince. So it's not a done deal, but it seems like something will, will come out of this. [00:04:37]As for the legislation, it doesn't really make sense. I mean, it doesn't make a ton of sense. Like, you know, I never thought that the first one made a lot of sense. You know, we've been saying for you, a carbon tax is really the best way to do it. Like capitalism takeover. We're not accounting for the pollution that goes into the air. [00:04:57]If we accounted for that, everything would be fine. So, you know, this is just like kind of another like weird hack bandaid kind of thing. I mean, it, it is obviously not fair to Tesla and GM and soon Nissan, I guess that they have to you know, they, they may the early investments in EVs and now [00:05:23] Now th the competitors who kind of can, you know, leverage the battery technology that came out of, you know, Tesla and GM's early investments, you know, at LG or something those they can take advantage of that. And so LG packs in their cars and they, they get a $7,500 taxpayer GMs. [00:05:41] Fred: That's a good point. [00:05:42] And then see like that, like Companies like a Hyundai or whatever, like , they still benefit from like the partnership with LG and [00:05:54] innovation. But I mean the same principle applies. [00:05:57] Seth: Right? So, I mean, there's a lot of things that kind of make it unfair. I mean, it should be something across the board. And then of course, like people are going to be upset that like you can buy Teslas plaid model S. And get a $7,000 rebate on $120,000 car. [00:06:13] Like nobody who, who is going to buy $120,000 car. It needs a $7,000 rebate. [00:06:19] Fred: Yeah, I would have thought that they would have yeah. W w w if you're updating the program, might as well introduce a cap like that, that, that one I have to admit that's a bit, it's a bit tricky. Like, yeah. I like to see those discount on, on cheaper vehicle, like the bowl, like the model three and everything, but if you're going for a plan or as you probably can afford it, you don't need to, you don't need the refund. [00:06:41] Seth: Interesting. So there was a little part in that the bill. The, I got this from the Mike Thompson house.gov site. There's a part of it, section four Oh two on page, end of page four of it for the use bars used cars, right? Yeah. And in that one buyers with up to $30,000 or $60,000 for married couples filed jointly in adjusted gross income can claim the full amount of the credit, the credit. [00:07:04] So that one is based on. Or that bit is based on the income of the people earning it. And that, that is for the, the EVs should not exceed the price of 25,000. So that's going to be probably not many Teslas there. You know, some old [00:07:24] ones, perhaps. [00:07:25] Fred: So they, they, they were thinking about it at least. Cause they did it for the, for the use, the car rebates. [00:07:30] So why not do it for the new one? I mean, I do understand, like the idea is just to try to convince someone that is looking for a new car, a, you want to incentivize them to choose an electric one over a gasoline one. So that that's the goal. So that's the goal at. Any, any where on the market? W whether it's luxury or not, but here's the thing in the higher end of the market. [00:07:56] Now, it's not, it's custom, petitive the all electric version. Like, if you're looking for something like the plaid model S, there's nothing like it. Gasoline powered. Like there's nothing that gets the kind of performance that that car gets. So if you, if you're looking for that kind of performance, you got to go with them all. [00:08:13] So being incentivized to get it, it doesn't make it [00:08:19] Seth: right. So you know, this is probably going to get, you know, changed a bit before it finally gets signed and put into law. You know, hopefully it does. But you know, maybe it's more focused on getting a lower cost cars out there. [00:08:38] Fred: Oh yeah. I mean also. [00:08:41] Most of the incentive is going to go through those. I mean, it just, you just look at the production volume, then that's ready and that that's where the cars are going. So, so it's not that big of a problem either, but it's, it's certainly gonna be an attack vector for whenever this, this bill is debated and I'm sure they're going to use that. [00:09:01] Seth: Rena. We know the, that the line already, it's going to be like, Oh, we're supporting tax breaks for billionaires that are buying Teslas, you know, like that's we th it's already, it's already been done. Yeah. Yeah, [00:09:14] Fred: we we've heard it before, but but ultimately it's going to be, it's going to be positive for X everything and the vehicle adoption in the U S there's no doubt about it, especially with bunch of other vehicles coming to market right now that are on the lower hand of the market. [00:09:27] $7,000 difference on a 30, $40,000 car. Makes it be a much bigger difference than on a 60, $70,000 car should that that's going to be a big deal. Whether people are saying that 400,000 like a cap, again, this is not ideal, especially not for Tesla with the kind of volume they're doing right now. Like this is, this could literally just last a year for Tesla potentially. [00:09:48]I'm not, I'm not sure. Sure. If that's the case, especially with. Like it's 400,000 deliveries in the us. And I mean, with the mall, why more, three production capacity right now, Fremont, it could, it could be fairly quick. But I don't know, like a w w we're going to have to see also there's a thing There's a, there's a phase out period. [00:10:07] Again, it's not, it's not as generous or a phase out period. So what they say here is that the prevision replays, the current for his up period with a phrase up here that incident begins during the second quarter after this, the, the, the instead begins during the second calendar quarter after Sasha and Charles. [00:10:25] And so you have basically two quarters. After you hit the 600,000 deliveries or of still having the full, so, so if you have a high production rate at that point, you can still take advantage of that. $7,000 a lot. I mean, desolate and could pronounce she's still like have. 200, $300,000, 300,000 more deliveries in the 600,000. [00:10:50] It could, it could reach to close to a million, really a total. So so it's still, it's still very the vintages. So and with the timing of it too, w what's gonna be interesting is that it's going to open up the tax credit, maybe to cyber truck buyers at this point. Like, Oh yeah, that's interesting. Yeah, depending on when this is enacted and if it is exactly like that, which again, we've said that it's not necessarily the case, but you, you gave it, you gave it like, let's say a year for this, that hit the front hundred thousand. [00:11:18] So that, that puts you somewhere in 2022. And then you still have six months of, of that $7,000 access. So. I mean, I don't think so. That puts you like in second half, maybe of 20, 22. I don't know. I could kind of volume production tests, like an eight on this laboratory at this point, but still, and the higher production capacity. [00:11:38] Do you have for all the vehicle programs that you all going to get at a big boost from [00:11:42] it? Yeah. Maybe even the Roadster will get it. Yeah. A little discount. [00:11:47] Okay. Yeah, baby, potentially though, again, that's the one that's going to go well with people with other people. If you get access to that. [00:11:55] Seth: Yeah, but I think the sh the story in the short term is going to be all right. [00:11:58] So now this is being talked about when we think it's pretty likely to happen, but between now, and when it happens, like, is Tesla going to really, or Tesla and GM and whatever, whoever else are they gonna, are there going to be a lot of people just waiting for that to drop and, you know, our customers Number's going to go way down in the U [00:12:17] Fred: S I mean, doesn't make much sense to, to, until you have some clarity over, over that happening. [00:12:23] I mean, I wouldn't buy one personally, like right. $7,000. $7,000. Yeah. And for people who say, Oh, you're just like a subsidy leech and you're trying to get us us. I mean, no if, if you understand the meaning of that, of that incentive, that's incentive is there because there's a cost that is not accounted for when you buy a gasoline vehicle that you burned, if that fuel we, we, you, you just started with that said that the carbon tax will, will make us more. [00:12:48] We'll make more sense than that. And we all agree on it, but this is actually our next step. And next article that we're going to discuss is regarding Elon Musk was on Joe Rogan this week, an episode of the Joe Rogan experience. Very interesting talk now lasted about three hours, but we got a few tidbits of information were really interesting in it. [00:13:08] And one of it that color high was that, eh, Elan. Said that he talked with the Biden administration about implementing a carbon tax and they apparently weren't really receptive to it in his word. He s…
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