Fuel efficiency of NZ imported cars jumps 15 per cent
Wednesday, 13 October 2021
A 15 per cent improvement in the fuel-efficiency of newly-imported cars from three months ago is “proof” the Government’s ‘feebates’ scheme is working, Transport Minister Michael Wood says.
Wood said new figures showed that new and second-hand cars imported in September would produce an average of 147 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometre travelled.
That is a dramatic decrease from June, when the average emissions of imported cars was 173g/km.
The first stage of the Clean Car Discount was partially introduced on July 1 and initially offers rebates of between $2300 and $8625 to buyers of newly-imported electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids.
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Wood said the drop in emissions over the three months the rebates had been in place equalled the improvement that had been made in the previous eight years.
It was “proof our Clean Car Package is helping drive down emissions quickly”, he said.
“Making this much progress in only three months is very encouraging.”
The ‘stick’ in the ‘carrot and stick’ Clean Car Discount scheme is due to kick-in from April, imposing fees of thousands of dollars on the import of high-emission vehicles.
The rebates and fees are intended to balance out overall, so they encourage car buyers to make more environmentally-friendly choices without leaving the Government either better or worse off.
Motor Industry Association (MIA) chief executive David Crawford said it supported the feebate scheme, which he agreed would help lower emissions.
But he said September was an “odd month” that included a large shipment of vehicles from Tesla.
About 21 per cent of vehicles imported in September were some form of EV or hybrid, and comparisons over a longer period would be needed to quantify the impact of the feebate scheme, Crawford said.
“We are still operating under a number of influences that are disruptive to the even supply of vehicles. The frequency of shipping is nowhere near its pre-Covid level.”
Wood said the progress that had been achieved boded well for the proposed introduction of the separate Clean Car Standard, which the MIA argues contains emissions targets that are too ambitious.
As drafted, that standard would phase-in a stepped reduction in the average emissions of most imported passenger vehicles to 145g/km in 2023, dropping to 63.3g/km in 2027.
Separate reduction targets would apply to imported utes.
Data compiled by the MIA indicates the targets would shift New Zealand from being one of the dirtiest importers of cars – with goals less ambitious than India, the United States and Brazil – to one that was out in front of the EU and Japan, based on their current targets.
Crawford said climate change was the single biggest issue facing humanity, but the “new and super aggressive” emissions targets for 2026 and 2027 were a “nasty surprise”.
The MIA withdrew its support for the Clean Car Standard last month when the new targets were set out in proposed legislation.
Car dealers that missed the emissions targets would need to either pay penalties or buy ‘credits’ from importers that managed to come in under the target, if they were available.
All the emissions figures quoted by the Government are based on the new, stricter WLTP (Worldwide Harmonised Light Duty Vehicles Test Procedure) emissions measure.
That means they may not correspond to the targets quoted in official documents and media reports in previous years that were normally based on the less stringent NEDC (New European Driving Cycle) measure in use since the 1980s.