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Germany sets out major cash incentive for electric car buyers
Deutsche Welle ^ | 18.05.2016 | Ben Knight

Posted on 05/19/2016 7:27:55 AM PDT by Olog-hai

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s cabinet agreed Wednesday to set aside some €600 million ($675 million) of taxpayers’ money to encourage people to buy electric cars — via an “environmental bonus.” The costs of the scheme will be shared with the auto industry, which is also putting up €600 million.

New car-buyers stand to get a €4,000 ($4,500) subsidy if they buy a purely electric car, and €3,000 if they opt for a hybrid car, which combines a battery and a small combustion engine. Not only that, electric cars will be exempt from motor vehicle taxes for 10 years.

Economy Minister Sigmar Gabriel sold the scheme as vital to Germany’s industrial future, arguing that electric cars will be key to maintaining Germany’s leading position in the European auto industry. […]

But the plan was criticized almost as soon as it was proposed — chiefly by environmentalists, economists and the German Taxpayers Federation (BdSt). …

(Excerpt) Read more at dw.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Travel
KEYWORDS: electriccars; eussr; germany; subsidy

1 posted on 05/19/2016 7:27:55 AM PDT by Olog-hai
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To: Olog-hai

Goodbye diesel cars in Germany!


2 posted on 05/19/2016 7:30:45 AM PDT by Lockbox
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To: Olog-hai

Will an electric car outrun a horny muzzie?


3 posted on 05/19/2016 7:31:06 AM PDT by albie
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To: Olog-hai

Germany would be better served if Merkel invested that money into rape whistles for all of the women in Germany.


4 posted on 05/19/2016 7:32:22 AM PDT by ObozoMustGo2012 (q15.)
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To: Olog-hai

Great plan for a country whose infatuation with green energy has left them desperately short of energy of any kind to power these totems to Gaia.


5 posted on 05/19/2016 7:38:40 AM PDT by Paine in the Neck ( Socialism consumes EVERYTHING!)
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To: Olog-hai

They’ll have to crank up more coal plants to power them.


6 posted on 05/19/2016 7:40:10 AM PDT by headstamp 2 (Fear is the mind killer.)
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To: albie

It depends whether he’s on a camel or not.


7 posted on 05/19/2016 7:45:08 AM PDT by Undecided 2012
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To: Paine in the Neck

At this point in the game (I live in Germany, so I can observe this)...no one ever cites how much draw this would add up to....if you had one-quarter of the nation on electrical cars. It amazes me how often the topic of electrical cars comes up, and I see at least three or four per day.

So imagine having two million people in some urban region (like Frankfurt) and they all come home around 5 to 7 PM, and plug the cars into their house/apartment building charger. Is there enough juice? Will they want to have some timer system where the chargers only come on after midnight? What will the cost factor add up to?

The 4,000 Euro rebate involved? Well, the majority of people who might be interested in this....will be urban dwellers of major cities, and have a two-car family. They might use the car to drive to work. What companies will feature charging devices? Almost no company wants to put these on their property and get into any electrical consumption game....even if the worker pays for the charge.

In my region, there’s a town near the autobahn that got a state grant two years ago and out next to a McDonalds (as you enter the autobahn), there’s this small pavement pad that got put up and two charging points sitting there. It’s rigged up for a traveler to come off the autobahn, hook up for an hour and walk across to the Micky D’s for a burger while waiting. Well...the journalists went and talked to the burger folks and asked them....have you ever seen in the 18 months that charger has been set up....anyone using it? No. No one has ever used it....they confirmed this via the town mayor who says that ‘they will come eventually to use’.

What no one brings up as well...is that battery-charged bikes are now showing up and becoming a big fad as well.


8 posted on 05/19/2016 7:50:20 AM PDT by pepsionice
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To: Lockbox

What will they generate the electricity with since they are shutting all their nuke plants?


9 posted on 05/19/2016 7:53:22 AM PDT by Kozak (ALLAH AKBAR = HEIL HITLER)
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To: Olog-hai

Oh no! Kraftwerk will have to re-record Autobahn (1974) with electric car sounds. It just won’t be the same. Think sewing machines with doppler effect.


10 posted on 05/19/2016 8:16:56 AM PDT by Disambiguator
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To: pepsionice

I work with people in the power distribution field. They say the additional draw will be a problem as you describe. In addition, on hot summer days, where the air conditioning has been going non-stop for hours, the transformers only have a small window of time in the night hours to cool. A large draw like charging a car will cut into that cooling time, ultimately shortening the life of the transformers.

As a result, the people I know anticipate entire neighborhoods would have to have new (larger) transformers installed, if electric cars ever became the norm.

Locally, we have a Tesla charge station near an Arby’s...again I guess so people can eat while they wait. I’ve seen it used twice. But I have noticed that there is a monster transformer hidden behind a 10 foot tall fence, to serve around 12 chargers.


11 posted on 05/19/2016 8:36:01 AM PDT by lacrew
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To: Olog-hai

That taxpayer supplied subsidies are required is all you need to determine whether electric cars are a good idea. In case you haven’t had your morning coffee yet, it indicates they are a horrible idea.


12 posted on 05/19/2016 8:38:24 AM PDT by TheDon (BO must be replaced immediately for the good of the nation and the world!)
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To: Kozak

Coal, Germany has lots of Coal!


13 posted on 05/19/2016 9:54:05 AM PDT by Lockbox
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To: pepsionice

Germany is also going full speed for renewables for power generation. Solar power isn’t available for overnight charging. Maybe people could charge up where they work, but that adds to the daytime peak loads. The best fit for electrics would be to tap in to the extra baseload capacity at night. But that is coal or nuclear.


14 posted on 05/19/2016 10:48:43 AM PDT by Vince Ferrer
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To: Olog-hai

Any technology that the Germans develop today will be given to the Kraut Caliphate tomorrow.


15 posted on 05/19/2016 10:51:35 AM PDT by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: Lockbox

They are more into Global Warming then Zero and his minions at EPA are.


16 posted on 05/19/2016 12:54:17 PM PDT by Kozak (ALLAH AKBAR = HEIL HITLER)
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To: Kozak

In 2013 coal made up about 45% of Germany’s electricity production


17 posted on 05/19/2016 3:08:32 PM PDT by Lockbox
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To: Lockbox

“Coal-fired plants with a capacity of 2.7 gigawatts will be shut down,” said the government sources, who declined to say how many plants will be closed.

“The affected power plants will not be allowed to sell electricity on the normal energy market,” they said, adding that with this step Germany would manage to reach its goal to curb CO2 emissions by 40% by 2020 compared with 1990 levels.”

http://www.euractiv.com/section/energy/news/germany-to-shut-down-coal-fired-plants-extend-power-grid/


18 posted on 05/19/2016 4:11:19 PM PDT by Kozak (ALLAH AKBAR = HEIL HITLER)
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To: Kozak
Well with limited sun shine in Germany for solar power, their ............. screwed!

You can buy an electric car, we just never said you could buy the electricity to charge your electric car.

19 posted on 05/19/2016 4:43:44 PM PDT by Lockbox
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To: Vince Ferrer

If you look at numbers that are published....solar energy isn’t delivering any big numbers for the national grid....wind energy is. I saw some numbers from 2014 which put wind energy up over 50-percent of the grid and they were thinking by 2020 of having 80-percent of the grid covered by wind.

I read last month that they’ve made some technology development with the design of windmills....which will make them 30-percent more efficient in the future.


20 posted on 05/19/2016 9:33:32 PM PDT by pepsionice
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