Another US state adds electric bike subsidy, this time with up to $1,700 rebate
Electric bicycles are quickly proving to be one of the best ways to get drivers out of cars while still providing fast, efficient personal transportation. And rebate programs that help reduce the cost of expensive e-bikes are now making them more affordable than ever before.
While a national electric bike subsidy looked likely last year, it faltered before the finish line and failed to be included in the Inflation Reduction Act.
Individual cities and states have since picked up the slack. Vermont launched the first state incentive program in the US. Denver, Colorado, also launched an incredibly popular e-bike rebate program that repeatedly sold out, and New York is now flirting with its own e-bike rebate.
Now Oregon could become the latest US state to offer a generous electric bike rebate.
A new bill known as Legislative Concept (LC) 1994 has been proposed by outgoing Oregon State Representative Karin Power to help provide rebates to e-bike buyers. It is now being passed off to Representative Dacia Grayber to sponsor the bill in the upcoming session.
The proposed bill provides a rebate of up to $1,200 off the purchase of an electric bike (non cargo) or up to $1,700 off the purchase of an electric cargo bike. In order to qualify, the e-bike must have a minimum retail sales price of $950, which precludes the cheapest e-bikes on the market.
The buyer is required to retain ownership of the e-bike for one year — no flipping allowed.
Bike accessories purchased within the same transaction, such as a helmet or lock, can also be covered by the rebate.
There are no income minimums to qualify for the rebate, but individual e-bike retailers must first register to become part of the program. Upon acceptance, they will be able to provide point-of-sale rebates to customers and then will be reimbursed by the State of Oregon within 30 days.
The bill allocates $6M for the program to cover both the cost of the rebates and general administrative costs of running the program.
With the 2023 session of the Oregon Legislature beginning in early January, we’ll be keeping an eye out for news of the bill’s advancement.
Electrek’s Take
This is exactly how money should be spent. If you want to invest in your state, in improving roads, in improving health, and in improving the lives of everyone who moves around your cities, then you need to invest in alternative transport like electric bikes, scooters, etc.
I think an income cap would have been a good idea to include here though. Wealthy folks have a much easier time buying a $1,500 e-bike than those who are already struggling to make ends meet and just need their own private form of transport aside from waiting for the bus.
I find the $950 minimum retail price interesting, as it removes the ultra cheap e-bikes. Those are often (but not always!) lower quality and tend to be thought of as “disposable e-bikes” as they don’t last very long, frequently turning into bulky e-waste.
Lastly, I’m not sure how they plan to enforce the requirement that owners keep the bike for one year. There’s obviously room for abuse here with people buying a $2K cargo e-bike for $300 and selling it on eBay to riders in other states. But hey, even if that happens, then it still means someone is riding an e-bike instead of a car… it’s just that Oregonians footed the bill.
via: Bikeportland
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British oil and gasoline company BP (British Petroleum) signage is being pictured in Warsaw, Poland, on July 29, 2024.
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British oil giant BP on Tuesday posted slightly weaker-than-expected first-quarter net profit, following a recent strategic reset and a slump in crude prices.
The beleaguered oil and gas major posted underlying replacement cost profit, used as a proxy for net profit, of $1.38 billion for the first three months of the year. That missed analyst expectations of $1.6 billion, according to an LSEG-compiled consensus.
BP’s net profit had hit $2.7 billion a year earlier and $1.2 billion in the final three months of 2024.
The results come as the energy major faces fresh pressure from activist investors less than two months after announcing a strategic reset.
Seeking to rebuild investor confidence, BP in February pledged to slash renewable spending and boost annual expenditure on its core business of oil and gas.
BP CEO Murray Auchincloss told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” on Tuesday that the firm was “off to a great start” in delivering on its strategic reset.
“We had a great operational quarter. We had our highest upstream operating efficiency in history. Our refineries in the first quarter ran at the best they’ve run in 24 years. We had six exploration discoveries in a row, which is really unusual and we started out three major projects,” Auchincloss said.
For the first quarter, BP announced a dividend per ordinary share of 8 cents and a share buyback of $750 million.
Net debt rose to $26.97 billion in the January-March period, up from $22.99 billion at the end of the fourth quarter. BP had previously warned of lower reported upstream production and higher net debt in the first quarter, when compared to the final three months of last year.
Shares of BP fell 3.3% on Tuesday morning. The firm is down roughly 8% year-to-date.
Activist pressure
BP’s green strategy U-turn does not appear to have gone far enough for the likes of activist investor Elliott Management, which went public last week with a stake of more than 5% in the London-listed firm.
The disclosure makes the U.S. hedge fund BP’s second-largest shareholder after BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, according to LSEG data.
Elliott was first reported to have assumed a position in the oil and gas company back in February, driving a share price rally amid expectations that its involvement could pressure BP to shift gears back toward its oil and gas businesses.
BP’s Auchincloss declined to comment on interactions with investors when asked whether the firm was under pressure from the likes of Elliott to go beyond the plans announced in its February pivot.
Notably, BP suffered a shareholder rebellion at its annual general meeting earlier this month. Almost a quarter (24.3%) of investors voted against the re-election of outgoing Chair Helge Lund, a symbolic result that reflected a sense of deep frustration among the firm’s shareholders.
Mark van Baal, founder of Dutch activist investor Follow This, told CNBC last week that he hoped the shareholder revolt means Amanda Blanc, who is leading the process to find Lund’s successor, will look for a new chair who is “climate competent” and “will not respond to short-term activists so quickly.”
Lund is expected to step down from his role next year.
Takeover candidate
BP’s underperformance relative to industry peers such as Exxon Mobil, Chevron and Shell has thrust the energy major into the spotlight as a prime takeover candidate. Energy analysts have questioned, however, whether any of the likeliest suitors will rise to the occasion.
BP’s Auchincloss on Tuesday said that he wouldn’t speculate on whether the company is a takeover target, but confirmed the oil major had not asked for any sort of protection from the British government.
“What I will say is we’re a strong, independent company and we’ve got sector-leading growth. And if we can deliver the sector-leading growth, and the first quarter is a fantastic example of that, then I have no concerns. I think we’re going to do great,” Auchincloss said.
Murray Auchincloss, chief executive officer of BP, during the “CERAWeek by S&P Global” conference in Houston, Texas, on March 11, 2025.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Oil prices have fallen in recent months on demand fears. International benchmark Brent crude futures with June delivery traded at $65.19 per barrel on Tuesday morning, down more than 1% for the session. That’s lower from around $84 per barrel a year ago.
Asked whether weaker crude prices could put the some of the firm’s reset plans in jeopardy, Auchincloss said, “Not really. We have a balance of products that we think about that generate revenue for us. So, oil, natural gas and refined products as well.”
— CNBC’s Ruxandra Iordache contributed to this report.
Germany’s largest offshore wind farm under construction, EnBW’s He Dreiht, just hit a big milestone: The first enormous turbine is now up in the North Sea.
He Dreiht – which means “it spins” in Low German – is using Vestas’s massive 15 megawatt (MW) turbines, the first project in the world to install them. Just one spin of one of the rotors can generate enough electricity to power four households for an entire day.
When it’s finished, He Dreiht will have 64 mega turbines cranking out 960 megawatts (MW) of clean power – enough to supply around 1.1 million homes. And it’s being built without any government subsidies.
EnBW, one of Germany’s major energy companies, has been working in offshore wind for more than 15 years, but He Dreiht is their biggest project yet. “It will play a key role in helping us to significantly grow our renewable energy output from 6.6 GW to over 10 GW by 2030,” said Michael Class, who heads up EnBW’s generation portfolio development.
The project is a win for Vestas, too. “With the installation of the first V236-15.0 MW, we have reached an important milestone for both the He Dreiht project and our offshore ramp-up, which helps Germany build a more secure, affordable, and sustainable energy system,” said Nils de Baar, president of Vestas Northern & Central Europe.
He Dreiht is located about 85 kilometers (53 miles) northwest of Borkum and 110 kilometers (68 miles) west of Helgoland. At peak times, more than 500 workers will be out at sea building the farm, using a fleet of more than 60 ships. EnBW’s offshore team in Hamburg is running the show.
The installation process is a major operation. The 64 foundations were already set in the seabed last year. Parts for the turbines are loaded onto the installation vessel Wind Orca in Esbjerg, Denmark, and shipped out in a 12-hour journey to the construction site. From there, the turbines are lifted into place. Meanwhile, crews are also working on internal wind farm cabling.
A partner consortium made up of Allianz Capital Partners, AIP, and Norges Bank Investment Management owns 49.9% of the shares in He Dreiht.
Read more: Trump admin halts $5 billion NY offshore wind project mid-build
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Tesla has released a quick update about its Tesla Semi factory in Nevada. It says that it is on track for volume production of the electric semi truck in 2026.
The Tesla Semi was first scheduled to go into production in 2019, but it has faced numerous delays.
Now, it appears that there is finally some momentum to bring it to volume production.
For the last two years, Tesla has been working to build a new factory next to Gigafactory Nevada, where it builds the battery packs and drive units for most of its electric vehicles built in North America.
Today, Tesla released a “progress update on the factory, confirming that it finished building and it’s now working on deploying the production lines:
Tesla had previously mentioned aiming for volume production by 2025, but it is now only talking about starting production toward the end of the year and ramping up next year.
The automaker reiterated its planned production capacity of 50,000 units.
We recently reported that an early Tesla Semi customer, Ryder, stated that the electric truck program is experiencing more delays and a price increase described as “dramatic.”
They now expect to take deliveries of their first trucks later in 2026 and said that the price has increased “dramatically,” leading them to scale back their pilot program from 42 to 18 Tesla Semi trucks.
When originally unveiling the Tesla Semi in 2017, the automaker mentioned prices of $150,000 for a 300-mile range truck and $180,000 for the 500-mile version. Tesla also took orders for a “Founder’s Series Semi” at $200,000.
However, Tesla didn’t update the prices when launching the “production version” of the truck in late 2022. Price increases have been speculated, but the company has never confirmed them.
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