B.C. trims EV cost rebate threshold by $5,000 (2024)

Say what you will about Tesla, but there is no denying the EV automaker isn’t timid about acting fast. And embracing government rebate programs. A day before news broke that the B.C. government was trimming the EV rebate threshold from $55,000 to $50,000, Telsa dropped the price of its Model 3 rear-wheel-drive by $1,000 to get under that adjusted bar. The new price is $49,990. This marks the first time a Model 3 has been priced under $50K in Canada, apart from the very limited software-limited 151-km Standard Range Model 3 that was priced at $44,990.

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The move by the B.C. government to change the rules to qualify for a $4,000 EV rebate, according to Minister of Energy, Mines and Low Carbon Innovation Josie Osbourne in a statement to Glacier Media, came as a reaction to “electric vehicle sales increasing faster than anticipated and currently on record levels.” Besides tweaking the threshold on the MSRP of qualifying vehicles, there has been a change to vehicle classifications, with SUV and station wagons moved from the “larger vehicles” category to “cars.”

Osbourne noted that despite the reduction of the threshold, there are more than 70 new EV trims that still qualify for the provincial rebate. She added adjustments were required to the CleanBC EV rebate program “given available funding,” and hoped the lower threshold would spur automakers to lower new EV prices — as Tesla did — and produce less-expensive electric vehicles.

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This isn’t the first time there has been a change to the program. In 2019, the threshold was cut from $77,000 to $55,000, and three years later an income-test was introduced where individuals with an annual income over $80,000 do not qualify.

Reactions from the Canadian Automobile Dealers Association (CADA) and the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers’ Association (CVMA) were swift. Saying the cut to the rebate threshold “makes absolutely no sense,” CADA CEO Tim Reuss decried how the decision was made too quickly, and without any consultation with stakeholders. Echoing those sentiments, CVMA CEO Brian Kingston predicted there will be “serious negative consequences for consumers, industry and the provincial economy.”

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Global Automakers of Canada’s David Adams said the change to how SUVs are classified will “place a chill on demand.”

“We’ve never suggested incentives should be in place forever,” he continued, “but they need to be in place until price parity with [internal-combustion engine] vehicles is achieved — and we are not close to that.” CVMA’s Kingston noted that that price gap is currently about $14,000.

The $5,000 federal EV rebate is still available in all provinces, and works on top of any provincial rebates. These include those offered in British Columbia; Newfoundland and Labrador; Manitoba; New Brunswick; Nova Scotia; Prince Edward Island; and Quebec, although Quebec plans to reduce the rebate amount each year, and ultimately close the program by 2027. Ontario had the country’s most generous rebate, at up to $14,000, but it was scrapped in 2018 by the then-incoming government.

In the 2024 budget, the federal government said since the rebate program launched in 2019, “zero-emission vehicles have grown as a share of all new-vehicle sales from 3% to 11% in 2023,” and that during that period, Canadians purchased or leased more than 450,000 ZEVs.