France Planning New Ways To Get Old, Heavily Polluting Cars Off The Road
The government of France is reportedly now planning a series of tax and incentive implementations meant to get some of the oldest and/or most heavily polluting cars off the country’s roads.
In addition, the country’s government is planning to incentivize the installation of energy saving insulation in houses, according to the country’s environment minister.
These new plans will be presented as part of the 2018 government budget, and will include/comprise a set of measures meant to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution problems, the French Environment and Energy Minister Nicolas Hulot was quoted by the newspaper Liberation as saying.
Reuters provides more: “Hulot said he would propose that a €500 to €1,000 incentive to switch to a less polluting vehicle, so far only available to low-income families, should be available from 2018 to all citizens who own cars with petrol engines registered before 1997 and cars with diesel engines registered before 2001.
“The sum will not only be for buying new cars but also relatively new second-hand vehicles with low carbon dioxide emissions … Hulot also said that for low-income households the incentive would be doubled to €2,000. He added that for a low-income family buying a small second-hand car, the incentive could add up to more than half of the vehicle’s value.
“Some three million old cars are eligible for the conversion incentive and the ministry hopes around 100,000 of these will be replaced next year. All car owners who switch to an electric vehicle will receive a €2,500 switching incentive on top of a €6,000 subsidy if the measure is approved.”
There is also a plan to provide up to €3,000 to low-income families in order to clean up their heating sources. If they drop diesel fuel heating systems and buy renewable energy heating systems instead (those would be wood-fired heaters or heat pumps), then they become eligible for that cash support.
Overall, that all sounds like a pretty good deal if it goes through.
Notably, Hulot also revealed that plans are for France’s carbon tax to increase to €44.60 per tonne in 2018 — up quite a bit from the current rate of €30.50 per tonne. Plans still call for the rate to increase to €100 per tonne by 2030.
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