President Joe Biden, an enthusiast with his own vintage Corvette, will showcase his administration’s efforts to promote electric vehicles Wednesday during a visit to an auto show in Detroit.
Biden is going to the North American International Auto Show to talk business, touting the huge new climate, tax and health care law that offers tax incentives for the purchase of electric vehicles.
While Biden has taken credit for the recent boom in EV battery and assembly plant announcements, most were in the works long before the Inflation Reduction Act was signed into law on August 16. Biden’s infrastructure legislation for 2021 could have something to do with it. — Provides $5 billion over five years to help states create a network of EV charging stations.
Under the latest law, electric vehicles must be made in North America to be eligible for a new federal tax credit of up to $7,500. Batteries for qualifying vehicles must also be made in North America, and there are requirements for battery minerals to be produced or recycled on the continent. The loans are intended to create a supply chain for electric vehicles in the US and end dependence on other countries, mainly China.
Passage of the measure set off a scramble by automakers to speed up efforts to find North American-made batteries and battery minerals from the US, Canada or Mexico to make sure electric vehicles are eligible for the credit.
In April, Ford began building electric trucks at a new factory in Michigan. General Motors has renovated an old factory in Detroit to make Hummers and electric trucks.
Long before lawmakers compromised on the legislation, each company announced three EV battery factories, all joint ventures with battery manufacturers. A GM battery plant in Warren, Ohio, has already started manufacturing. A government loan announced in July will help GM build its battery factories.
Ford said last September that it would build the next generation of electric trucks at a plant in Tennessee, and GM has announced electric vehicle assembly plants in Lansing, Michigan; Spring Hill, Tennessee; and Orion Township, Michigan. In May, Stellantis, formerly Fiat Chrysler, said it would build another joint venture battery factory in Indiana, and announced a battery plant in Canada.
Hyundai in May announced assembly and battery plants to be built in Georgia, and Vietnamese automaker VinFast announced factories in North Carolina in July. Honda and Toyota announced battery plants in the US after the law passed, but they had been planned for months.
Biden has been talking for a long time about the importance of building a domestic electric vehicle supply chain and that may have pushed some of the companies to locate factories in the US but it is also advantageous to build batteries close to where the electric vehicles will be assembled. because batteries are heavy and expensive to ship from abroad.
Republicans on the House Oversight Committee warn that the Biden administration’s push for electric vehicles will benefit Chinese tech companies and hurt American jobs.
In a letter to Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg last month, the 16 lawmakers led by the committee’s ranking member Rep. James Comer, R-Kentucky, write that they are examining “the false claims” made by the Biden administration. on the impact of electric cars on American jobs.
[Con información de The Associated Press]
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