Quebec plans to spend more than a half-billion dollars on a green transportation plan over the next three years.
Premier Pauline Marois says the plan includes up to $8,000 in subsidies for the purchase of electric or hybrid vehicles; and up to $1,000 for people installing a charging unit at home.
She says the goal is to add 12,500 electric vehicles on Quebec roads by 2017, accelerating a program introduced under the previous Charest government.
It also calls for 5,000 public charging stations; 525 electric taxis; and 25 electric trolleys in Montreal.
In the days leading up to the announcement, there was some controversy over the fact that Hydro-Quebec chairman Pierre Karl Peladeau had been sitting in on Parti Quebecois cabinet meetings about the plan.
Peladeau is also the president of Quebecor, which owns the province’s main tabloid papers and private TV network, along with the Sun media chain in English Canada.
Before the announcement, his Journal de Montreal newspaper reported exclusive details of the plan in a multi-page spread, promoted on the cover.
I agree with Damien that the money would be better invested in public transport. I do not quite get electric cars given that the electricity has to come from somewhere (massive hydro dams, river diversion projects, etc.). I guess it is marginally better than fossil fuels. Have you seen the documentary ‘People of a feather’? Who would have thought that the impact of the big hydro dams in Quebec are contributing not only to killing off the eider duck but also heating the oceans? What is happening in terms of solar powered cars? If you can fly around the world in a solar plane…
Well I’m glad to know that ,once again, Canadian taxpayers get to subsidize Quebec’s socialist agenda.
Well, lets be thankful the money wasnt being shovelled into the Seperatist trough like so many other billions of Canadian taxpayers dollars have over the past 40 years……
One wonders how long after Quebec seperates the true fiscal reality of their “have not” provincial tax funded situation will dawn on them…. 12 months? 24 ?
Either way, I wouldnt want to be the “President” of Quebec when that ugly little fact rears its head.
Quebecois mobs with pitchforks havent been seen in at least 150 years…..
how is going greener socialist? am i missing your point. Europe is so far ahead of North america in every aspect. We would be wise to look at europe’s ways…
Jimi
Well if you want to compare European apples to European apples. Lets pretend that instead of Canada’s taxpayers subsidizing Quebecs latest expensive foray into the 21st century we have…
German taxpayers subsidizing say….Greece’s expensive summer Olympics of a few years ago. Im sure the German taxpayers love to contiually fund Greeces ever expanding debt especially when they squander money on project such as the olympics that have essentially zero payback.
As for Europe being “so far ahead of North America in every aspect”. Europe is half the size of Canada with almost 600 million people. Thus rapid transit is cheaper to build(shorter distances to cities) and garanteed to make money( greater population densities= greater ridership).
Even with all those advantages(that N.A. doesnt have) they are now reaping what they have sown.
Horribly over extended budgets, bankruptcy(Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece, Spain..aka PIIGS) looming and the other nations fed up constantly bailing them out when ever they come calling for more money.
Electric highways will eventually come.
Its inevitable.
But every time a govt gets involved the price quadruples and the taxpayers eat it.
I pay enough taxes thanks.
Let the private sector build the fricken thing WHEN it becomes financially viable.
It reminds me of the “green” Vancouver winter Owe-limp-icks
when BC announced a “hydrogen highway” from Vancouver to Los Angeles.
A pie in the sky project that never went anywhere.
ok yes those are good points. I lived in switzerland for the past year and yes its a tiny country so your points hit home there. But one thing i don’t understand is why switzerland with basically no natural resources can afford to pay high salaries and have low costs, leading to a very happy populous. If the Canadian Gov’t took over the natural resource extraction side of canada, the govt would have the profits instead of the little royalties that it receives now. It could use the profits to fund many programs here in canada. The natural resources of Canada belong to the canadian people not to a private company so it makes sense to me. am i wrong? let me know what you think…
The thing that is so often missed in these sort of critiques of public subsidies for green transportation is the degree to which subsidies for oil-based transportation dwarf those for more sustainable alternatives.
Motorists make a big deal about bridge tolls, but very few of those tolls exist (just 2 out of a dozen bridges in Metro Vancouver); meanwhile, transit users pay continually rising tolls every time they make a trip – they’re called “fares”. This on top of the fact that single-occupant vehicle-oriented infrastructure receives far greater taxpayer subsidies than transit, electric vehicle, pedestrian and cycling infrastructure ever receive. It’s just better hidden. They don’t rub motorists’ faces in it like their do transit riders. The subsidies come by way of $5 Billion public-private-partnership deals, shadow tolls, and growing budget deficits.
Drivers over the Port Mann Bridge today pay $1.50 each way. The other day I took a 20 min bus from downtown Vancouver to West Van to have lunch with a friend. By the time we finished an hour later, my transfer had expired. So it cost me $8.00 to go over the Lions Gate Bridge and back.
The bottom line is just about every industry and sector is subsidized in some fashion. And we get what we pay for. If we want to increase productivity, improve health outcomes from a reduction in air pollution and do our part to address climate change, then we need to prioritize green transportation and renewable energy. So long as we choose to funnel more tax dollars into fossil fuels and old-school, oil-powered, single-occupant vehicle infrastructure, we’ll just keep barrelling down the path to an unsustainable future.
PS I’d far rather see Quebec invest this money in public transit than electric vehicles.
Interestingly enough, due to the newer fuel efficient vehicles now being produced…. “gas taxes” arent generating enough revenue for some govts.
The state of Oregon is now looking at instigating a VMT(Vehicle Miles Travelled) tax on top of the fuel tax currently charged.
This is due to the fact that new small cars drive far more miles on the same gallon of gas that their older versions did. Gas fuel consumption is actually dropping in the US over the past two years.
But I digress.
The VMT will be calculated by GPS in each vehicle and will be charged monthly( much like the TREO user pay system on the new Vancouver bridges that we have.).
Oregon has rolled out this system to aprox 1500 vehicles to see how the system will work.
Dont kid yourself.
If this works.
And it will.
Every other jurisdiction on the planet will adopt it as another revenue source