Avis has new T&Cs for renting its EVs, and they’re a little weird
Tesla Model 3 Source: Tesla
Car rental giant Avis just sent an email out today to its customers to let that it has new rental terms and conditions for its fleet EVs. Some of the company’s EV rules are a bit of a head scratcher.
Here’s what the email said:
As we introduce Electric Vehicles to our fleet, our rental terms have been amended. To accommodate our expanding vehicle inventory, this amends the agreement signed by you with respect to the rental of a vehicle powered by an electric motor (an “EV”). Our updated terms can be found here.
Note that these were sent out by Avis Canada, but the rental terms and conditions are for both the United States and Canada.
I’ve pasted the seven-plus points terms included in the EV section below, and my comments are after each point, in bolded italics:
39. ELECTRIC VEHICLE (EV) TERMS. This EV Amendment amends the rental agreement signed by you with respect to the rental of a vehicle powered by an electric motor (an “EV”) from Avis Rent A Car System, LLC, Aviscar, Inc., or any Avis Rent A Car System, LLC, affiliate, or the independent Avis Rent A Car System, LLC, licensee identified on the rental agreement (collectively referred to herein as “Avis”).
Boilerplate text. All good. Next.
1) AMENDMENT TO RENTAL AGREEMENT: This EV Amendment simultaneously amends the terms of your rental from Avis with respect to the terms herein only. All other terms of your rental remain in full force and effect. In the event of any conflict between the terms of this EV Amendment and your other rental terms, the terms of this EV Amendment shall govern.
More boilerplate. Nothing to see here.
2) ONE WAY RENTALS ARE NOT PERMITTED: Due to unique infrastructure needs associated with EV’s, your EV must be returned to your rental location on the date/time specified in your rental terms. If your EV is not returned to the renting location, all costs incurred in transporting your EV back to the renting location will be assessed to you. In addition, you will be assessed a fee for Avis’ loss of use of the EV between the time that you should have returned the EV to the renting location and the time that it is returned to the renting location up to a maximum of thirty (30) days. The loss of use fee will be your daily rental rate.
“Unique infrastructure needs.” LOL.
At the end of January, a couple of us at Electrek received a PR announcement announcing that Avis was launching a “significant number of EV charging stations at the George Bush International Airport in Houston” with EverCharge. The EV charging stations will “only be used by the Avis and Budget fleets of EVs and PHEVs available for rent” at Houston airport.
I asked, “How many EVs does Avis have for rent across the US, and which makes and models?” And got the reply: “Avis is not commenting on the specifics of its fleet at this time.”
Bummer, because Hertz sure is commenting, and with Tom Brady to boot.
I asked the spokesperson how many EV charging stations Avis is installing at Houston airport, and they wouldn’t tell me – they only said that both DC and Level 2 are being put in.
I asked what the rollout plan is for other North American airports, and got the reply:
Following the launch at the Houston airport, Avis and EverCharge plan to extend the partnership to additional airport locations this year.
So, based on the above information, it would appear that the reason why a car rental customer has to return the EV to the original rental location – in this case, airports – is because Avis doesn’t have enough EV charging infrastructure yet.
I get that this is a growing pains issue, but simply, it isn’t very practical. Not everyone returns to the place where they rented a car.
Maybe Avis should have installed more EV charging infrastructure before it rolled out its unknown quantity of EVs.
One can currently rent a Tesla Model 3 from Avis in seven US states – all in the West. It’s kind of silly that one can’t drive between those locations without having to return to home base.
3) BATTERY CHARGING LEVELS AT VEHICLE CHECK OUT: Avis will rent the EV with at least a 70% charge on the battery. The range of your EV will vary based on a number of factors including vehicle load, driver’s actions such as speed and acceleration, climate and terrain factors such as inclines. Avis does not warrant or guarantee the range of an EV.
Why 70%? The ideal topped-up charge level is 80%. If Avis has EV chargers at its rental locations, then it should charge them to 80%.
And Avis ought to print up a helpful document, or give renters a QR code, so they can read about why and how vehicle load, speed, and acceleration affect charge. Let’s not say there are factors without explaining them.
4) BATTERY CHARGING LEVELS AT VEHICLE RETURN: Your EV must be returned to Avis with a battery charge level of at least 70%. If returned at less than 70% but more than 10% battery charge level, a charging fee of $35 will be assessed to you. If returned with less than a 10% battery charge level, you will be assessed an additional low charge fee of $35 (a total of $70 charging fees if returned with a battery charge of less than 10%). The charging fee is based on the kilowatt hours, overhead, loss of use of the EV and administrative costs Avis incurs in charging the vehicle. Note: fees assessed in the United States refer to U.S. dollars and fees assessed in Canada refer to Canadian dollars.
A $35 car charging fee is a bit steep. Let’s say a driver returns the car with 50% charge – the amount of money to bring it to 70% would be around US $5 at the most.
An 80kwh Tesla battery x 20c/kwh (high estimate) = $16 assuming 0-100% charge.
But I guess this is like when you bring a gas car back empty without prior arrangements, and car rental companies charge you a really high fill-up fee. And if Avis has DC chargers, then they won’t have to wait long to charge up a car that has a battery charge level of less than 70%.
5) ROADSIDE ASSISTANCE: Roadside assistance is available for your EV but fuel cannot be delivered to EV’s. If you require roadside service because you depleted your EV’s batteries, your EV will be towed to your renting location and the towing expense will be assessed to you. If you require another vehicle due to a breakdown, you may be provided a gasoline powered vehicle in which case, all fuel provisions of your rental terms shall apply with respect to your replacement vehicle.
“Fuel cannot be delivered to EVs” – heehee. Love it. It would be cool if Avis invested in some mobile EV charging trucks to make up for the fact that they don’t actually have enough EV charging infrastructure yet to service their EV fleets.
Why can’t the EV be towed to the nearest Tesla Supercharger or Electrify America or similar? Why does it have to go all the way back to the renting location? What if the driver is on a road trip? This one definitely qualifies as weird. This may scare some people off who wanted to try an EV for the first time.
6) SPECIAL EV EQUIPMENT: All EV equipment including, but not limited to, charging equipment, keys, key cards, fobs and/or remote (“EV Equipment”) provided with your EV must be returned. The full replacement cost of any EV Equipment not returned with your EV will be charged to you. LDW, even if elected, does not cover EV Equipment.
Maybe this is a legal thing, but surely it would be common sense that keys, key cards, and fobs would have to be returned, much like any gas rental car? Perhaps Avis has experienced some customers throwing away key cards because they think they’re like hotel key cards? At any rate, I’d be pretty annoyed if I was an Avis employee and customers kept throwing away the key cards, so fair enough. Fobs is a bit of an overstretch. I guess they just had to mention them to cover backs.
7) UNIQUE TESLA TERMS: If you rented a Tesla EV, you will be able to access Tesla Superchargers, subject to availability, to recharge Tesla vehicles provided, however: 1) any fees, charges and/or costs to access and utilize the Tesla Superchargers shall be your responsibility; 2) any Tesla “idle fees”, as defined and charged by Tesla, shall be your responsibility (see Tesla’s website for details https://www.tesla.com/support/supercharger-idle-fee); and 3) the provisions of “Battery Charging Levels at Vehicle Return” shall continue to apply to you.
These are fair terms, because they’re essentially Tesla terms 101.
TESLA VEHICLES MAY NOT BE WASHED AT AN AUTOMATIC CAR WASH. ANY DAMAGE CAUSED BY AN AUTOMATIC CAR WASH SHALL BE ASSESSED TO YOU PURSUANT TO THE “DAMAGE/LOSS TO THE CAR” PROVISIONS OF YOUR RENTAL TERMS AND WILL NOT BE COVERED BY LDW.
I love the bold capital letters for the CAR WASH RULES. One can take Teslas through car washes, but only in touchless car washes. Teslas have Car Wash Mode.
Maybe Avis decided that putting its Teslas into Car Wash Mode is too complicated for its customers and too much like hard work for its reps to explain how to use the feature to every EV renter? It’s never occurred to me to take a rental car to a car wash, but I’m not fastidious with my cars. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this car wash thing in the comments below.
Photo: Tesla
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GM may have decided to pull the plug on the forward-looking Chevy Brightdrop electric van a few months ago, but don’t let that stop you, but don’t let that fool you. Right now might be the best time ever to get your hands on one.
SKIP THE STORY: jump right to the deals (trusted affiliate link).
It’s hard to overstate how good the deals on Chevy’s Brightdrop got while GM was still trying to build up demand for its fleet-focused van, and now that the company has decided to stop production, the deals have gotten even better, with a newly announced $699 lease for 39 mo. with $2,999 down through January 2nd — and that’s before you factor in an additional $3,000 discount reserved for Costco Executive Members!
Despite that, I’ve heard more than one fleet manager express hesitation at the thought of adding a discontinued product to their fleet, even if it is a killer discount. To them, I offer the following, model-agnostic rebuttal:
Legacy brands support their products
Companies like GM aren’t going anywhere soon, and neither are the customers they’ve spent millions of dollars acquiring over the past several decades. They’ll keep building parts and offering service and maintenance on vehicles like the Brightdrop for at least a decade — not least of which because they have to!
GM sells each Brightdrop with a minimum 8 year/100,000 mile warranty on the battery and other key components, which can be extended either through GM itself or through reputable third-party companies like Xcelerate Auto for seven more.
There are precious few large fleets out there looking at 15 year, 200-plus thousand mile vehicle replacement cycles. For those that are, however, all indications so far are that the vehicle’s battery health and general performance will still be well within usable limits.
So, yes: parts longevity and manufacturer support will be there (something I’d be less confident about with a startup like Rivian or Bollinger, for example), but there’s more.
Section 179 and local incentives
The One Big, Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) of 2025 gutted America’s energy independence goals and ensuring its auto industry would fall even further behind the Chinese in the EV race, but the loss of Section 45W wasn’t the only change written into the IRS’ rulebook. Section 179, an immediate expense reduction that business owners can take on depreciable equipment assets, has been made significantly more powerful for 2025.
The section 179 expense deduction is limited to such items as cars, office equipment, business machinery, and computers. This speedy deduction can provide substantial tax relief for business owners who are purchasing startup equipment.
The revised Section 179 tax credit (or, more accurately, expense reduction) allows for a 100% deduction for equipment purchases has doubled to $2.5 million, with a phase-out kicking in at $4 million of capital investments that drops to zero at $6.5 million. That credit and can be applied to new and used vehicles, as well as charging infrastructure, battery energy storage systems, specialized tools, and more (as long as they’re new to you).
What’s more, with regional incentives like the up to $15,000 off a new medium-duty van available from Illinois utility ComEd, the net cost of GM’s $699 promo lease drops to ~$315/mo., and there is still state money out there, as well, depending on where you live.
All of which is to say: don’t let a little thing like GM discontinuing the Brightdrop convince you to skip it. If you do that, the bean counters that killed off the Buick Grand National, GMC Syclone, and Pontiac Fiero win.
SOURCE | IMAGES: GM Envolve.
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US Energy Information Administration (EIA) data released on November 25 and reviewed by the SUN DAY Campaign reveal that, during the first nine months of 2025 and for the past year, solar and battery storage have dominated growth among competing energy sources, while fossil fuels and nuclear power have stagnated.
Solar set new records in September
EIA’s latest “Electric Power Monthly” report (with data through September 30, 2025), once again confirms that solar is the fastest-growing source of electricity in the US.
In September alone, electrical generation by utility-scale solar (>1 megawatt (MW)) ballooned by well over 36.1% compared to September 2024, while “estimated” small-scale (e.g., rooftop) solar PV increased by 12.7%. Combined, they grew by 29.9% and provided 9.7% of US electrical output during the month, up from 7.6% a year ago.
Moreover, generation from utility-scale solar thermal and photovoltaic systems expanded by 35.8%, while that from small-scale systems rose by 11.2% during the first nine months of 2025 compared to the same period in 2024. The combination of utility-scale and small-scale solar increased by 29.0% and produced a bit over 9.0% (utility-scale: 6.85%; small-scale: 2.16%) of total US electrical generation for January-September, up from 7.2% a year earlier.
And for the third consecutive month, utility-scale solar generated more electricity than US wind farms: by 4% in July, 15% in August, and 9% in September. Including small-scale systems, solar has outproduced wind for five consecutive months and by over 40% in September.
Wind leads among renewables
Wind turbines across the US produced 9.8% of US electricity in the first nine months of 2025 – an increase of 1.3% compared to the same period a year earlier and 79% more than that produced by US hydropower plants.
During the first nine months of 2025, electrical generation from wind plus utility-scale and small-scale solar provided 18.8% of the US total, up from 17.1% during the first three quarters of 2024.
Wind and solar combined provided 15.1% more electricity than did coal during the first nine months of this year, and 9.8% more than the US’s nuclear power plants. In fact, as solar and wind expanded, nuclear-generated electricity dropped by 0.1%.
Renewables are now only second to natural gas
The mix of all renewables (wind, solar, hydropower, biomass, and geothermal) produced 8.7% more electricity in January-September than they did a year ago, providing 25.6% of total US electricity production compared to 24.2% 12 months earlier.
Renewables’ share of electrical generation is now second to only that of natural gas, which saw a 3.8% drop in electrical output during the first nine months of 2025.
Solar + storage have dominated 2025
Between October 1, 2024, and September 30, 2025, utility-scale solar capacity grew by 31,619.5 MW, while an additional 5,923.5 MW was provided by small-scale solar. EIA foresees continued strong solar growth, with an additional 35,210.9 MW of utility–scale solar capacity being added in the next 12 months.
Strong growth was also experienced by battery storage, which grew by 59.4% during the past year, adding 13,808.9 MW of new capacity. EIA also notes that planned battery capacity additions over the next year total 22,052.9 MW.
Wind also made a strong showing during the past 12 months, adding 4,843.2 MW, while planned capacity additions over the next year total 9,630.0 MW (onshore) plus 800.0 MW (offshore).
On the other hand, natural gas capacity increased by only 3,417.1 MW and nuclear power added 46.0 MW. Meanwhile, coal capacity plummeted by 3,926.1 MW and petroleum-based capacity fell by an additional 606.6 MW.
Thus, during the past year, renewable energy capacity, including battery storage, small-scale solar, hydropower, geothermal, and biomass, ballooned by 56,019.7 MW while that of all fossil fuels and nuclear power combined actually declined by 1,095.2 MW.
The EIA expects this trend to continue and accelerate over the next 12 months. Utility-scale renewables plus battery storage are projected to increase by 67,806.1 MW (a forecast for small-scale solar is not provided). Meanwhile, natural gas capacity is expected to increase by only 3,835.8 MW, while coal capacity is projected to decrease by 5,857.0 MW, and oil capacity is anticipated to decrease by 5.8 MW. EIA does not project any new growth for nuclear power in the coming year.
SUN DAY Campaign’s executive director Ken Bossong said:
The Trump Administration’s efforts to jump-start nuclear power and fossil fuels are not succeeding. Capacity additions from solar, wind, and battery storage continue to dramatically outpace those from gas, coal, and nuclear, and by growing margins.
Read more: EIA: Solar + storage dominate, fossil fuels stagnate to August 2025
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The bZ3X is off to a strong start as Toyota’s most affordable electric SUV, starting at around $15,000 in China.
The bZ3X is a $15,000 Toyota electric SUV in China
Toyota’s joint venture, GAC Toyota, launched the bZ3X in China this March, an affordable, compact electric SUV aimed at young families.
The bZ3X is Toyota’s “first 100,000 yuan-level pure electric SUV,” starting at just 109,800 yuan, or roughly $15,000.
By May, the electric SUV was the best-selling foreign-owned EV in China, beating out the Volkswagen ID.3, Nissan N7, BMW i3, and Volkswagen ID.4 CROZZ.
According to the latest update, the bZ3X remains a hot seller. GAC Toyota announced that bZ3X sales exceeded 10,000 units for two consecutive months, with 10,010 units sold in November. Cumulative deliveries have now surpassed 62,000 units.
GAC Toyota recently put the electric SUV through rigorous testing on a winter road trip across China, “showcasing its impressive capabilities as a 100,000-yuan-class pure electric vehicle.”
Measuring 4,645 mm in length, 1,885 mm in width, and 1,625 mm in height, the bZ3X is about the same size as BYD’s popular Yuan Plus (sold as the Atto 3 overseas).
Inside, the electric SUV is a major upgrade over the Toyota vehicles we’re accustomed to, with advanced ADAS features, smart storage, and large digital screens.
The bZ3X is available in seven different trims in China, two of which include a LiDAR. Upgrading to the LiDAR version costs 149,800 yuan ($20,500).
Toyota’s electric SUV is available with 50.04 kWh and 67.92 kWh battery pack options, providing a CLTC range of 430 km (267 miles) and 610 km (379 miles), respectively.
Less than two weeks ago, GAC Toyota launched pre-sales for the bZ7, a new flagship electric sedan. According to Toyota, the new flagship EV “possesses a higher level of intelligence than any of Toyota’s offerings in global markets,” as the automaker fights to regain market share in China’s fierce auto market.
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