🚗 Big week for EVs

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Every Monday morning, you get a 5-minute recap on the news and insights from the week in climate business, tech, and policy.

This week’s debrief includes:

• EV Acceleration Challenge and new guidance on tax credits.

• $24 billion wave of climate-related losses facing meat and dairy farms.

• $54M for fleet electrification, $11M for a heat pump installation software, and $5M to build operating system for renewable energy plant

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EV Acceleration Challenge and new guidance on tax credits highlight a huge week for electric vehicle adoption.

EV Acceleration Challenge

The White House has announced the first set of public and private commitments to support the US transition to electric vehicles (EVs) under the EV Acceleration Challenge. The announcement is part of President Biden’s goal to have 50% of all new vehicle sales as electric by 2030.

The commitments from companies and non-profits include expanding EV fleets, increasing consumer education, and growing the availability of EV charging.

A few highlights:

• First Student, a major supplier of school bus services, is committing to transition 30,000 fossil fuel-powered school buses to electric school buses by 2035.

• Prologis, a major global developer and owner of logistics real estate with more than 3,400 properties in the US, is committing to make every new eligible Prologis development ready for EV charging and transition its U.S. maintenance vehicle fleet to 100 percent alternative fuel vehicles by 2030.

• SWTCH, an EV charging provider,is committing to expand equitable access to EV charging in underserved communities by deploying over 20,000 EV chargers, the majority of which will serve multi-family buildings, by 2024.

• Rewiring America, a non-profit organization, is committing to launch an online personal electrification planner in 2023 with the initial goal of helping 100,000 homeowners and renters create roadmaps to electrify their homes and to choose electric vehicles and home chargers.

• Plug in America, a non-profit organization, is committing to reach 250,000 consumers over the next year with PlugStar.com, its online EV information and shopping tool.

• GreenLatinos, Hip Hop Caucus, Sierra Club, Clean Energy for America, Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments, Electric Transportation Community Development Corporation, National Religious Partnership for the Environment, Plug in America, Public Citizen, Union of Concerned Scientists, Electric Vehicle Association, League of Conservation Voters, Coltura, and the Natural Resources Defense Council are committing to launch Route Zero in April – a cross-country, relay style campaign highlighting the investments made in EV infrastructure and EV manufacturing around the country, focusing on how equitable EV deployment helps mitigate pollution harms.

In addition to these commitments, federal agencies have already acquired 13,000 zero-emission vehicles in fiscal year 2023, and federal agencies are committing to deploy an additional 24,000 charging stations at federal facilities by the next fiscal year.

The Inflation Reduction Act has added and expanded tax credits for the purchases of new and used EVs, incentivizing the electrification of heavy-duty vehicles such as clean school buses and the installation of residential, commercial, and municipal EV charging infrastructure.

New guidance on IRA’s EV tax credits

The US Treasury Department has released its interpretation of the strict and intricate legal mandates surrounding the implementation of electric vehicle (EV) material sourcing in last year's climate law.

The regulations dictate which models can meet the complex eligibility requirements for consumer subsidies of up to $7,500 per vehicle. The guidance has been welcomed by manufacturers for providing "increased clarity and certainty", but concerns about the effects of the new laws on the market remain.

There are risks, including political blowback from lawmakers who say the Biden administration is not doing enough to curb Chinese influence on the US economy. The White House hopes that the subsidies, alongside manufacturing incentives and other pro-EV programs, will boost deployment and curb reliance on China, a dominant player in battery materials.

Read more:

• Biden-⁠Harris Administration Announces New Private and Public Sector Investments for Affordable Electric Vehicles

• Biden EV tax credit guidance leaves uncertainty on China

• Joe Manchin Threatens to Fight Treasury Over EV Tax Credit Rules

The southern Sierra Nevada mountains in California have an unusually large snowpack that will melt from April to June. Good for an extended ski season, bad for downstream communities with less robust water management infrastructure.

• Amogy secured $139M in funding to expand its ammonia-based fuel for cargo ships. As the shipping industry seeks cleaner fuels, the startup aims to introduce an ammonia-powered vessel in New York. International shipping accounts for roughly 3% of GHG emissions each year.

• IntegrityNext raised €100 million in funding for its platform that automates the monitoring and auditing of suppliers for compliance with environmental and sustainability governance (ESG) rules, including those established internally and those mandated by increasing regulations./

• CHARGE+ZONE raised $54M for fleet electrification and retail EV charging company, with plans to build 3,000 high-speed DC charging stations by 2025 and expand network.

• ZEWAY raises €27 million to expand its network of Battery Swapping Stations at large scale as a way to accelerate urban electric mobility

• Revolv raised $15M in Series A funding to help medium-to-heavy commercial fleets turn all-electric.

• Lun raised $11M in seed funding for a heat pump installation software provider that helps homeowners decarbonize.

• Chargetrip raised $11M in Series A funding to expand it’s EV routing platform's passage to the US.

• ampere.cloud raised $5M in Series A funding to build operating system for renewable energy plant management.

• OneThird raised $3M in seed funding to scale its shelf life predicting food waste tech and support fresh produce supply chains in North America and Europe.

• Recompose launched a $5M crowdfunding campaign to make sustainable burial and funeral operations.

• The best solar panel you can buy is... by Quinn Emmett at Important, Not Important.

• Crops grow where cash flows - A framework for understanding the business of farming by Ariel Patton at Topsoil

• 10 quick takeaways from the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report from Natalie Lavery at Climate People.

• Let's Ask ChatGPT: How Do Solar Cells Work? by

  Matthew Gordon at The Slow Moving Apocalypse

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