Tesla has criticised the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries for claiming the price of the most popular petrol and diesel cars in Australia would jump by thousands of dollars under the Albanese government’s clean car plan.Tesla has criticised the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries for claiming the price of the most popular petrol and diesel cars in Australia would jump by thousands of dollars under the Albanese government’s clean car plan.
Tesla said the FCAI was instead arguing for a policy regime that does next to nothing, based on an existing voluntary program that it oversees. While the lobby group has described its proposal as “ambitious”, Tesla said it had been openly discussed within FCAI that it would not cut emissions before 2030.
Tesla took this to mean the FCAI was aware that the model it was arguing for would allow emissions to increase, but was suggesting the details could be changed years down the track. The FCAI’s claims that the price of the most popular petrol and diesel cars would jump by thousands of dollars under the government’s plan has been adopted by the federal Coalition, which describes the policy as a “family car and ute tax”.
Asked for its response to Tesla’s criticism’s, the FCAI said it had been encouraging successive governments to introduce an efficiency standard for more than a decade. Based its calculations on the most polluting type of each car model only. For example, when looking at the Ford Ranger it chose only its most polluting variant, the Raptor, which emits 262 grams of COper kilometre. But the government’s Green Vehicle Guide last year listed 42 variants of Ranger, including 20 that emitted less than 200g/km.