As previously mentioned, most states charge a fee at the time of registration of an EV to offset the lost gas tax revenue. Ten states currently have no fee, but I wouldn't expect this to last much longer. Thirteen charge $200+ per year with the highest being $260. All the others range from $50 to $175.
And because this is a registration fee and not a tax, is the DMV free to raise the fee whenever? At least the gas tax had to be voted on by the state legislature. As more EV's hit the road, expect these fees to increase.
And AFAIK, there is no allowance for low usage. If you are a retiree and only drive 5000 miles per year, you still pay the same. At $200 per year, you would have to drive a 30-m.p.g. car about 21K miles to have paid $200 in state gas tax. This will vary quite a bit by state.
Now on a factory EV, the DMV is of course going to automatically know which cars are EV and apply the fee. But I found it interesting that in my state, there is no mechanism to identify an EV conversion at the time of registration. No check box on the form.
Even more interesting is that there is no verbiage in the statute mentioning conversions at all. No reporting requirement, no inspection requirement. Nothing.
If you don't tell them, they won't know.
Now how long this will last is anyone's guess, but conversions are not popular enough here for it to have popped up on their radar yet.
So, apply the "Don't ask, don't tell" principle and revel in one of the few remaining times you can get one over on them.
Now, some will say that the fee imposed is not all that high and just pay it. It does not occur to them that the fee is not going to stay at this level much longer. My state already has a bill to raise the fee to $200 to be in line with most other states. There is also a provision in the same bill to tax the electricity at public chargers.
As we have seen in the UK, the gov't started out with no fees on EV's to encourage peeps to buy them. Then that expired last year and now they are required to pay a "Road Tax" from £200-£440 ($270-$593) depending on the car.
Now they have added a pay per mile charge of 3 pence starting in 2028. This is roughly 4 cents per mile. The average UK resident drives 7100 miles per year. This would amount to an additional $270 per year.
How long do you think it will be before they see this as a cash cow and implement it here?
Well, four states already have, and a dozen others are thinking about it.
In my state, you would have to drive a car that gets 30 mpg over 21K miles per year to equal the $200 EV annual fee.
The states that have already implemented the mileage fee are between 1-2 cents per mile.
The average miles driven in the US is 13500 per year. So, $135-$270 per year.
So, you see where this is going.
When there are enough EV's, how long do you think it will take to occur to them to tax home charging?
