Oregon’s Electric Vehicle Policy Fail
By John Charles
On September 15, the Oregon Department of Energy (ODOE) released its 2025 Biennial Zero-Emissions Vehicle Report, revealing that Oregon is far behind on its goal of purchasing 250,000 “zero emissions vehicles” (ZEV) by 2025. The report was established in 2019 by SB 1044 to push ZEV adoption.
As of May 2025, 119,850 such vehicles were registered in Oregon, equaling 3.2 percent of the total vehicle fleet. Of those, only 84,636 were true zero-emission vehicles powered entirely by a battery. The remaining 35,214 vehicles were plug-in hybrids, which still rely on gasoline.
These numbers show that we’ve reached 34 percent of Kate Brown’s arbitrary EV Adoption Targets established during her era. Even more ambitious goals were set by ODOE for 2035, stating “at least 90 percent of new cars sold will be zero-emission vehicles.”
Two obvious reasons come to mind for this failed goal. For starters, EVs cost more than traditional vehicles—a good deal more. For medium– and heavy-duty vehicles the purchase price can be double or triple the price of a diesel or gasoline powered vehicle. In practical terms, finding or installing a charging station can be difficult or expensive, making long-distance trips a challenge to plan.
Few people will notice this policy failure because few really care about electric vehicles. The ZEV report is just one example of political elites telling us what to do and then being ignored.
Will the Oregon Department of Energy learn from their failure and leave us alone? No. That’s why they work for the government. But if you like your car, gas powered or hybrid, just keep it. Bureaucrats can’t make you buy something you don’t want and can’t afford.
John A. Charles, Jr. is President and CEO of Cascade Policy Institute, Oregon’s free market public policy research organization.
Richard F Fink
Yet we keep electing the same people from the same party.
Jim Whiting
Our electric power grid is overburdened already without the addition of EVs, and crippled by the closing of fossil fuel power plants. Especially since the science is clear: We are not in control of atmospheric CO2 (see 1929-1931, and 2020, decreases in human CO2 output) and CO2 is not in control of global temperature.
Note: climatologist Randall Cerveny, unaware of the former, expressed disappointment that the 17% decline in 2020 production had no effect on atmospheric CO2. “We had had some hopes that, with last year’s COVID scenario, perhaps the lack of travel [and] the lack of industry might act as a little bit of a brake. But what we’re seeing is, frankly, it has not.”
Alas, we contribute little more than 4% to the annual input of CO2. And CO2’s GHG effect declines exponentially after the first 50% at 20 ppm, first discovered by Arrhenius and now the arithmetic is correct (Modtran, U. of Chicago). Meanwhile, its beneficial effect on plant life increases arithmetically, making them grow bigger and faster and resist drought. And all commercial greenhouses add CO2 to achieve levels
of 1,000-1,200 ppm. US Navy submarines do not address CO2 reduction until it reaches 8,000 ppm.
Art Lewellan
The larger problem is “car dependency” ie, daily commuting to workplace, routine drives for shopping, entertainment, get togethers with family and friends, etc. Over decades, these routine drives have also become more distant. Of the benefits EVs offer, the most important is their incentives to drive less. And toward that goal, shunned or welcomed, the EV that offers the most potential is PHEV plug-in hybrid.
John could’ve calculated a reported 45% of electricity generated in Oregon is via Natural Gas methane. Advocates for BEV disregard a full and fair consideration about this, failing to account for electricity generated via a utility grid that is not zero emission.
For another matter, rooftop solar arrays (when ‘matched’ to a PHEV in a garage or driveway) are more efficient than vast field arrays; a small rooftop solar array matched to a small battery PHEV battery pack creates an economic incentive to drive less. Rooftop arrays generate DC directly to the DC battery pack; no need to convert field arrays from DC to high voltage AC nor build long distance transmission lines that feed regional utility grids, both of which remain vulnerable to power outage.
One could also argue PHEVs are “safer” than BEVs. Keep a light touch on the accelerator pedal and the ICEngine will remain off, thus an incentive to drive at moderate speeds rather than mad acceleration to remain in the stampeding herd of motorists speeding to “beat the green stoplight ahead.”
I conclude, driving less is our only real solution to a myriad of problems related to car-dependency.