When I first learned the Maine Board of Environmental Protection was petitioned to consider the Advanced Clean Cars II Program, or “California rule,” my first thought was, “No, that can’t be right.” I mean, how can an obscure rule let 150 activists force a state board to consider such a seismic change that will hurt consumers and threaten our economy?
Apparently, it can. The new rule under consideration by Maine BEP subjects car dealers to new requirements regarding zero-emission electric vehicles. For the 2027 model year, 43% of new car sales must be EVs; that increases to 82% by the year 2032. (“Maine considering California-style incentives to encourage electric vehicle sales,” Dec. 13)
The real question for Maine BEP is whether they should adopt it. As an economics professor who truly believes in our free-market economy, they absolutely should not.
Instead of trying to improve vehicle emission standards, which is how the traditional regulatory process works, activists figured they’d just bypass the process and petition Maine BEP directly to take conventional gas-combustion vehicles off the road completely through sales limits. The devil is always in the details.
Republican caucus leaders recently sent a letter to Maine BEP outlining a range of issues with mandating EV vehicles to the public at such drastic levels. This follows a public forum held by BEP that drew hundreds of attendees and nearly a thousand comments where the vast majority of Mainers were opposed to EV mandates. A petition with 10,000 signatures in opposition to the new rule was also submitted.
Nationally, EV adoption is slowing down. Early adopters already have them and the high cost and impracticality of these vehicles, at least at the current time, is proving distasteful to the broader market. This market pushback has led major manufacturers such as Ford, GM, Honda and Volkswagen to scale back plans for new EV manufacturing plants and even some EV production.
That is how a free-market economy is supposed to work.
Maine is more inhospitable to EVs because of our extreme cold weather. Residents also travel a longer distance for work, pleasure and shopping, meaning there are real concerns about our unreliable charging infrastructure and limited vehicle ranges. Who wants their battery to die with no charging station nearby?
As noted in the letter to Maine BEP, there’s another real concern when it comes to repairs. When I spoke with several Maine auto dealers at a recent meeting, they shared customer concerns about repairs that cost thousands more than conventional vehicles and have taken months instead of weeks to complete.
According to these dealers, repairs can require double the replacement parts compared to conventional vehicles — and that is if you can even get them. Maine also lacks the infrastructure and personnel to make such repairs, especially when it comes to collisions. Anyone who owns an EV in the northern areas has to tow their vehicle to southern Maine just to get it fixed; that adds significantly to consumer costs.
Consumers have also complained about much higher insurance premiums, which can be far more costly per year compared to conventional vehicles. Mandating EVs will only add to the inflation we’ve already endured under the Biden Administration.
What bothers me most, however, is forcing the sale of a particular product by fiat. That is something we just don’t do in this country. It violates the fragile ecology of our free-market economy. Just look at the economic disruptions caused by government intervention during the pandemic.
Value creation and the utility consumers derive from that value are what bring balance to our economic system. Innovation by automakers is the tool to help fuel that demand. EV manufacturers are now at a point in the product lifecycle where they will need more innovation to appeal to the broader market.
When government intervention tips the balance, however, that’s where we get into trouble. Let’s avoid that and look for a better way.
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