We’ve said it a million times; New Jersey’s neighborhood new car and truck dealerships are ALL-IN when it comes to selling and servicing EVs, and they want to sell what consumers want to buy.
Both the Biden and Murphy Administrations have announced very aggressive EV goals over the next decade. It’s not a question of IF New Jersey will transition to a zero-emission transportation future. It’s only a question of WHEN. That is the heart of the debate among EV stakeholders on the best path forward for New Jersey to reach our shared goal of a 100% EV future.
The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection wants to adopt the California Advanced Clean Car II (ACCII) Rule as the primary mechanism for us to reach our EV goals. NJ CAR believes that blindly adopting ACCII will create unintended consequences that will hurt New Jersey consumers and make it MORE difficult to reach our EV goals, NOT easier.
Adopting ACCII will hurt consumers by negatively impacting two of the most important elements of a vehicle purchase — affordability and choice. It’s simple math, consumers will be forced to hold on to their older, less environmentally-friendly vehicles when they can’t afford the mandated vehicles or those vehicle choices don’t meet their specific needs.
ACCII could result in fewer vehicles being allocated to the State, as well as a limitation on base model vehicles in order for manufacturers to maximize profit on the vehicles they will be allowed to deliver for sale to ACCII states. New Jersey consumers lose because tighter inventories result in higher prices and/or less availability in the marketplace of base model vehicles.
ACCII would also severely limit consumer choice on ALL types of vehicles, as not all automakers will produce all popular makes and models as ZEVs. Consumers’ shopping choices are further limited by ACCII’s lack of support for ALL hybrid vehicle options.
Realistically, 100% EV sales in New Jersey will only occur when one of two things happen — all automakers build ONLY EVs, which is not the case so far since automakers want to continue to offer what consumers want to buy OR all consumers want to buy ONLY EVs, which has not happened anywhere. Consumers want options, and they will decide when we reach 100% EVs, not the government.
New Jersey needs to be realistic and plan a viable path to reach its EV goals. ACCII requires EV sales to reach 35% by 2026, increasing at a substantial rate until reaching 100% in 2035. That’s a 26% increase in EV sales over the next three years when it took nearly a decade for New Jersey to reach 9% EV sales. New Jersey can’t arbitrarily pick an EV sales percentage and assign it a date.
It’s not a choice between ACCII and nothing. It’s a choice between an unrealistic ACCII and the Biden Administration’s significantly more stringent EPA Clean Car Rule that was recently proposed. The EPA rule gives New Jersey a viable alternative path to compliance that doesn’t harm consumers.
Specific EV sales percentages aren’t mandated by the EPA’s proposed rule, but it does force automakers to produce more EVs. By comparison, ACCII locks New Jersey into a rule built for the California EV market and creates a wide variety of unintended headaches and obstacles for consumers, dealers and manufacturers.
NJ CAR has encouraged the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) to review ALL options and conduct a cost/benefit analysis on each option before making a decision that will hurt New Jersey consumers and the $40 billion auto retailing industry that is a key driver of the Garden State economy.
