Hybrid cars can act as a bridge to carbon-free mobility

livemint.com:

For all the policy promotion of electric vehicles (EVs), their sales figures in India have been a disappointment as far as four-wheelers go. Even hybrid cars, which get no policy push, have lately been selling more. Consider the automobile sales numbers for 2023-24.

In the second half of the year, around 52,000 units were sold of hybrids, which combine combustion engines with battery-powered propulsion to reduce fuel emissions. In comparison, sales of all-electric four-wheelers lagged at 48,000 units. For the full year, EVs nosed ahead with almost 100,000 units, while hybrids sold about a tenth less.

The latter have significant consumer appeal, evidently, in spite of bearing a heavier tax burden. This may explain why transport minister Nitin Gadkari has sent a proposal to the finance ministry, as reported, to place hybrids in the same 5% GST bracket as EVs. Currently, hybrids are taxed at par with fossil-fuelled vehicles: at the top GST rate of 28%, that is, with a cess levied on top of that, taking the effective levy higher.

It may be time, however, to incentivize hybrids too as we go about electrifying transport towards India’s overarching aim of carbon neutrality by 2070. The premise for treating hybrids like regular combustion cars was that they do not fully eliminate the use of fossil fuels, even if they stretch the distance every litre of a fuel-refill takes them. The fact that they are not entirely exhaust-free prompted critics to label them as old-tech in the guise of clean-tech.