What's Next? Plan B for EVs

I never thought I would say this, but I love driving my electric vehicle.

Driving was never my jam. I only got my driver’s license under duress, at age 51, when I went back to school for a master’s degree in journalism. If I was going to be a reporter, I was going to have to own a car and drive it. I still wasn’t crazy about driving, but it meant that I could get to wherever the stories were, which was cool and exciting; so, I appreciated it as a useful skill (when I wasn’t hyperventilating while dodging the 18-wheelers on highways in Southern California).

But, again, I love driving my EV — a Hyundai Ioniq 6, affectionately known as Sophia 6 (see photo above). Besides being a sleek and beautiful car, our girl provides a smooth, quiet ride and accelerates like nothing on earth. I also love driving by gas stations and not having to worry about the price of gas. I charge Sophia for free at the chargers at my apartment complex.

Now why I am telling you this has to do with the Republicans’ big, wretched tax bill, which will end current federal tax credits for EVs — $7,500 for new and $4,000 for used vehicles. EV sales in the U.S. have grown steadily in recent years, as prices have inched down and the number of models increased.

But they never reached the levels some had hoped they would, and the clawback of the tax credits will likely put a temporary damper on the market. Cox Automotive, a key industry analyst, is now predicting that EVs will make up 9% of new car sales in the U.S. in 2025, down from its original forecast of 10%.

President Donald Trump and the Republicans have long vilified any EV incentives or sales targets as “mandates” aimed at depriving Americans of their God-given right to buy whatever gas-guzzling, carbon-emitting car they want. The fact that transportation is the largest source of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions is no longer considered relevant to federal policy. 

So, the loss of the EV tax credits was something of a foregone conclusion once Trump was elected and began his second term, as were the rollbacks of federal standards for tailpipe emissions now underway at the Environmental Protection Agency.

This inevitability may account for why media coverage of the Republicans’ Megabill — as the mammoth budget reconciliation package is now being called — has focused more on the battle for clean energy tax credits and incentives. 

With the bill’s passage and signing — and its impact on EV and clean energy tax credits — a done deal, basic questions are impossible to avoid. What happens next? What is Plan B? Uncertainties remain, and no one expects quick or easy answers; but a shift in perspective is definitely needed.

This article is the first in a “What’s Next” series, where E/lectrify will be looking at the strategies individual companies and larger sectors of the clean energy industry are developing to keep the U.S. clean energy transition moving forward — with or without federal support. 

The EV tax credits will be terminated on Sept. 30, which could mean record EV sales over the next three months — and perhaps some really amazing holiday sales by year’s end.

In other words, the loss of the tax credits may not hit the market full force till 2026. But rather than being final or fatal, could a temporary drop in EV sales drive a market reset for U.S. automakers, allowing them to learn from past miscalculations and emerge smarter, stronger and more competitive in global EV markets?

The view from the road

We are in uncharted territory, but let’s start with the current state of the U.S. EV market as viewed from the roads where people drive. 

When you drive an EV, you tend to look for others who have made the decision to go electric. Just seeing other EVs in parking lots or on the road provides a visceral sense of validation and support.  

I live in a D.C. suburb with a diverse, professional and generally progressive population, so EV sightings are not unusual. The place is lousy with Teslas, of course. But on a recent Saturday morning, between my gym, the grocery store and my apartment — a drive of two or three miles — I saw a Tesla cybertruck, a Toyota bz4x electric SUV, two Volvo XC40s, also SUVs, a Polestar, an Ioniq 5 and two electric Kias, one e-Soul and one EV6.

I was so excited, I had to restrain myself from honking and waving at the drivers of each of the different models. Yes, transportation electrification is happening, and we are part of it.

Industry analysts like Cox and J.D. Power see the increased variety of EVs on the market — a total of 75 at present — as a major catalyst for more adoption, with electric SUVs leading the market. General Motors recently reported it doubled its EV sales in the second quarter of 2025, with a major boost from its Chevy Equinox SUV, which has a range of more than 300 miles and a starting price of $35,000.

Equally important, EV charging infrastructure is gaining ground and consumer confidence, according to a recent LinkedIn article by industry thought leader Jigar Shah. The U.S. has more than 200,000 public chargers at 70,000 locations, “and people are using them,” Shah said. Utilization rates are up, and in larger cities, public chargers are turning a profit.

Shah notes, “There’s real opportunity in EV charging today. But the upside will go to those with the humility to adapt the way they invest.”

Then you have cities like Burlington, Vt., which is trying out curbside chargers mounted on utility poles.

I have to admit that I put off any road trips with Sophia 6 — despite her over-300-mile range — due to some misplaced anxiety over finding public chargers that are up and running. But, I finally bit the bullet and recently did a 300-mile round trip, which involved a top-up charge before heading home. It took some advance planning and downloading a couple charging apps to ensure I had multiple options on the road, but the charge itself was easy. 

The DC fast charger had Sophia’s battery back up to 80% in 20 minutes and cost around $10. I got something to eat and sat outside in the sun, watching other EVs pull in for their top-ups, before hitting the road again. 

In other words, the market basics here are solid: increasing consumer choice and affordability, backed up by increasingly accessible and reliable infrastructure for charging — and people like me who suddenly love driving.

Meeting Chinese competition

What we don’t have, unfortunately, is a well-developed domestic supply chain for EVs — from critical minerals to final assembly — and automakers, regulators and lawmakers with the vision and willingness to take some risks.

U.S. automakers responded to the passage of the IRA and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and former President Joe Biden’s aggressive goals for EV adoption — 50% of all new car sales by 2030 — with ambitious electrification targets of their own. But, the minute sales did not meet their high expectations, General Motors, Ford and others started delaying new EV rollouts and backpedaling on previous pledges.

They also played it safe, catering to short-term market demand with higher-priced electric SUVs, instead of developing smaller, less expensive models that might appeal to a broader range of buyers. GM’s Chevy Bolt was a brief exception to the rule; small, popular and priced at $30,000 and under, it was introduced in 2017 and discontinued in 2023.  

The combination of Trump’s tariffs and the Megabill’s rollback of tax credits for EVs and advanced clean manufacturing are not likely to support a timely and efficient buildout of the supply chains needed for market growth. But such self-sabotage appears to be the administration’s desired outcome, aimed at keeping Americans dependent on the gas pump. 

The result, of course, is that China is quickly nailing down global EV markets through its dominance in battery supply chains and smaller, cheaper but still high-quality EVs, which at present cannot be imported into the U.S. EVs now represent about 50% of new car sales in China, which means once popular U.S. automakers — like GM and Ford — have seen their sales there plummet. 

The irony here is that if they want to regain sales in China, U.S. automakers will have to provide the kind of smaller, cheaper EVs they have so far refused to roll out in the U.S. After multiple visits to China, Ford CEO Jim Farley says his company is now working on the “Model T of EVs” at its Skunkworks facility in Southern California. 

Evidence of pent-up demand can be found in the growing sales of used EVs, which were up 39% year over year in March, Cox reports.  The secondhand market will be fed by leased EVs — like Sophia 6 — which could create a stream of up to one million used EVs by 2027. And Cox notes that used EVs are selling for about $2,000 less than their gas-powered counterparts.  

The hybrid gateway

The other trend that could bode well for the U.S. market is the rising popularity of hybrids and plug-in hybrids, the gateway vehicles to EV adoption. While carbon emissions may not be a top concern, American drivers are looking for more efficient, competitively priced vehicles, which is a first step.

I leased a hybrid Ioniq (Izzie Ioniq) in 2018, moved up to a plug-in hybrid (Patti Plug-in) in 2021 and went full electric with Sophia 6 in 2024. 

I started with a hybrid because at the time I could not afford an EV but could not, in good conscience, continue to drive a traditional gas-powered car. Hybrids not only need less gas, but they give drivers quick tastes of what it feels like to drive electric — those moments when the car switches from engine to battery and back again and you can feel the difference.

Plug-in hybrids extend that experience. I found that even the small battery in my plug-in could cover most of my daily errands, and I only needed to fire up the gas engine for longer commutes and road trips. I was filling up the tank maybe once a month, and by the time I was halfway through my lease, I was ready and eager to go full electric.

Of course, EVs have their downsides, which are mostly differences that simply take getting used to. The upfront sticker price may be higher, but is offset by the lower long-term cost of ownership. Similarly, miles per kilowatt-hour can drop rather dramatically in cold weather, but are offset by above-average mileage in warmer temperatures. Road trips may take more time and planning, but periodic charging stops could make a long trip a bit more fun and pleasant. 

And we are only beginning to explore the potential benefits and flexibility EVs can provide to the grid through managed charging and other vehicle-to-grid programs. Decarbonizing the grid must also be a priority to ensure we are charging our EVs with clean electricity.

The benefits of weaning oneself off the pump can be highly addictive, and once actually driven, EVs tend to sell themselves. I can’t help but wonder, how many of those Republican representatives and senators voting to roll back EV tax credits have ever driven an EV? Or perhaps they have already used the tax credit to buy a secret EV, now hidden in a garage back home.

Economics will always play a role, but consumers ultimately adopt new technologies because they are better — and in many if not most cases, EVs are better than gas-powered cars. They also are essential for cutting greenhouse gas emissions and mitigating the worst impacts of climate change.

With or without tax credits, the way forward must include a sense of urgency to reconnect the economic and environmental case for EVs with the pure joy of driving them. Saving the planet was never so much fun. 

Global markets, where one in four new car sales are EVs, are way ahead of us. The question now is whether we will use the loss of tax credits as an excuse for falling further behind or as the push we need to catch up and truly lead?