CalCars' plug-in hybrid prepay idea gets a major retooling: from $10,000 to $1,000
by Sebastian Blanco on Dec 17th 2008 at 7:50PM 
click above image for a high-res gallery of the Ford Escape PHEV
Since first proposing his plug-in hybrid (PHEV) prepay idea earlier this month, CalCars' Felix Kramer has not sat back and watched his baby grow. Instead, he's been talking and listening and has evolved his plan. Originally, the idea was to have plug-in vehicle supporters give their automaker of choice a $10,000 down payment on a PHEV to be delivered by 2012 at the latest. Payers would also get tax benefits for their "investment."
The five-digit price tag was a sticking point, though, and CalCars' new proposal reduces the reservation fee down to just $1,000, with the government matching each payment with $9,000. Kramer, in an email that is pasted after the break, said that the $1,000 amount "is enough money to show serious intent" while not limiting the playing field. Kramer also said that the proposal has been circulated among "policy people, Congressional staff - and enough people around the transition team to hope that it's been noticed." Whaddya think of the new idea?
[Source: CalCars]
MESSAGE FROM CALCARS:
CALCARS' DEC. 1 "PROPOSAL: PREPAY FOR PLUG-INS TO SAVE & TRANSFORM THE AUTO INDUSTRY" has gotten broad coverage. Among the online outlets that ran the full text are AutoblogGreen and EVWorld. Among the stories with comments are The Inspired Economist and:
- Automotive journalist Jim Motavalli at Mother Nature Network says "That's hugely ambitious, of course, but it's certainly a way to inject revenue into the failing auto industry. And if fleets (including government fleets) jump in that will be a big step forward....Plans like this are in synch with the rapid ramp-up envisioned by author Thomas Friedman in his book Hot, Flat and Crowded...."At this rate, vehicles won't arrive soon enough to save the auto industry -- let alone U.S. industrial leadership or the climate," Kramer says. He invokes the fact that Americans bought $17 billion in Liberty Bonds during World War I, and $185 billion in World War II War Bonds. If they could do it, he says, so can we.
- Green Car Advisor Scott Dogget at Edmunds went over the top in saying "Spend more than a few minutes speaking with Felix Kramer about electric cars and very quickly you wonder if he might be a genius who's ahead of his time. Like Better Place CEO Shai Agassi, Kramer (right) isn't afraid to think big when it comes to plug-in hybrid electric vehicles and straight electric vehicles. And this week Kramer -- founder of the California Cars Initiative, a Silicon Valley-based nonprofit organization that promote 100+ miles-per-gallon PHEVs -- proferred a really big idea...It's a compelling proposal.
- Author Paul Loeb at Huffington Post wrote a long and thoughtful analysis, including, "Here's the dilemma: Detroit needs to sell cars to survive, and they need to sell them now. But every fuel-inefficient car they produce and put on the road creates an additional lien on our common future, by increasing our oil dependence and producing tons of greenhouse gases over its ten-to-twenty year lifetime....Felix Kramer, who founded the plug-in-hybrid innovation and advocacy organization CalCars.org, has just come up with an idea that could solve the dilemma...This would give America's car manufacturers a huge pre-sold base for these cars, a massive incentive to getting them produced and ready for the market. It would also provide a major potential influx of capital." Loeb calls the idea "a work-in-progress" an "an innovative starting point."
EVOLVING THE PLAN: We've circulated the idea among policy people, Congressional staff -- and enough people around the transition team to hope that it's been noticed. At the same time, we've concluded that the original idea for $10K prepayments (refunded within months by federal tax credits) would limit participants to those who don't finance their cars. Talks with financial experts suggest an alternative. Buyers would pay $1,000 to reserve a car, and the federal government would match each payment with $9,000, all of which would go to carmakers under the terms described in the original proposal. $1,000 is enough money to show serious intent. Either way, the program represents a way to " allow consumers to invest in technologies that are essential to any future American economy" (LOEB) and "There's a certain parallel to the local food movement, which supports community-supported agriculture (CSAs), in which a group of people agree to pre-pay for a portion of an organic farmer's crop." (MOTAVALLI)
Our goal has been to get new ideas into the mix -- especially ones that link buyer demand with automaker performance. We'll keep you posted on any further progress.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jharlan 8:13PM (12/17/2008)
I am not giving a dime until I see Autoblog green's test on whatever we are getting!
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jharlan 8:14PM (12/17/2008)
They aren't getting a dime from me until I see AutoblogGreen's test results on the product!
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Me 8:07PM (12/17/2008)
good luck with that, Felix.
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jake 8:43PM (12/17/2008)
Doesn't seem that different from deposits for some of the cars from the smaller makers, except the government matching part.
First most people looking to make a deposit need a reasonable expectations and promises they will be making plug-ins. The D3 aren't even in the condition to get a stab at the $25 billion set out for tooling greener cars, so I doubt they will be making too much of an effort for plug-in cars in the near term. Only one I'm reasonably sure of happening is the Volt, but that's futher ahead. The Dodge EV and Ford EV are on shaky ground b/c they haven't shown much on the Dodge (also questions about the market for it) and the Ford EV is far from ready; they also aren't plug-in hybrids so they might not apply for this idea.
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Mike Z. 9:50PM (12/17/2008)
Reminds me of PanAm offering to take advanced reservations on Moon trips in 1969.
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Lad 9:57PM (12/17/2008)
The idea of buying EVs before they are build by an industry run by bean counters and in deep trouble is a leap of faith many will choose not to take.
I understand that the Tesla company has already sold about 600 prepaid cars and has delivered about a hundred. However, one must wonder if they will be able to build and deliver the next 500 in these times where the wall street thieves, working with a set of look-the other-way Washington politicians, have stolen the U.S. Treasury through the backdoor.
I think many people have lost their trust in our government and in the greedy large industries, including the oil, auto, drug and financial industries. Additionally, $30,000 is way too much for any automobile. I think $20,000 is closer to the price that would stimulate ownership of a factory BEV. My personal hope is someone will come out with a Li Ion BEV conversion kit for existing automobiles so I can move my 240z over to electric drive.
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tom engineer 10:28PM (12/17/2008)
so basically Mr. Kramer wants a huge ($9,000) gov't subsidy for every plug-in, before customers (or gov't) know what they're getting. I think it'd be fairer for gov't to set-up plug-in subsidy themselves for plug-ins depending on vehicle's environmental performance. Also, not enough people would simply pluck down $1000 for a vehicle that doesn't exist and they may get in a few years to make it a huge number of cars. Even if they did, at $9,000 a pop the government can't just give an unlimited number of such gifts, so the numbers would probably be limited from the government side, as well. And while this sounds nice, the idea that this would be a huge boost to the automakers' profitability is plain wrong: first of all, it wouldn't happen until ~2012 or later, secondly quantities would most likely be small, thirdly the cost of developing, retooling for, and producing plug-ins with good all-electric range would probably make the first few years of production a losing proposition even with a $9K bonus (unless the customers paid a full prize on top of that, but that would just limit volumes further).
A comparable subsidy is a great way for the government to promote plug-ins, but it would hardly help automakers, esp. in the short run. Also, who's to say Toyota pocket our government's money with Prius plug-in? However, this idea is neither bad nor outrageous: even McCain suggested a $7,500 plug-in tax credit.
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gorr 1:18PM (12/18/2008)
Don't believe plug-in technology, it's sh*t from the start and just goverment related persons and journalists here are pusching for that because their revenues come from taxes and they don't offer products on the markets. All subsidies and special projects are there to show that clean car don't exist and will never exist because the goverment related persons will blow-up everything before it can happen because many many persons have tax money revenue to heal the poors and if there is no more poor or un-educated persons then they will be out of jobs. The easiest exemple is imported oil and big oil then goverment army and goverment ethernal studies or all sort.
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dtv 3:39PM (12/18/2008)
I'm taking deposits on vehicles to be delivered two years earlier - 2010.
(now where did I put that Nigerian bank account number . . . )
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