Prius milestone just the beginning
The Green Car Congress reports that Toyoto has now sold more than 500,000 of its hybrid-electric cars worldwide, with 83 per cent of those sales coming from its popular Prius. If you think that’s impressive — and it is — consider what will happen when the cars go on sale in China in mid-December. Also consider that a new auto consumption tax will go into force next year in China. People who buy vehicles with large engines will pay significantly more tax than those who buy smaller-engined and fuel-efficient vehicles. This, of course, bodes well for the Prius as it makes its debut in China.
Funny, why can’t the Canadian government be this progressive with its tax policy? We don’t even have the guts to impose emission mandates, settling instead for a voluntary system that has never worked in the past.
Tyler Hamilton is senior energy reporter and columnist for the Toronto Star, Canada's largest daily newspaper. In addition to this Clean Break blog, Tyler writes a weekly column of the same name that discusses trends, happenings and innovators in the cleantech market. This blog is a personal project started in April 2005. It is not an official blog of the newspaper. Tyler can be reached at tyler@cleanbreak.ca