Members of Wyoming's House of Representatives and Senate are considering calling for a phaseout of new electric vehicle sales by 2035, as the traditional oil and gas industry has opened opportunities for employees and made an impact on the state's coffers through the contributed revenue.
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CORTE MADERA, CALIFORNIA - JUNE 27: An electric car charges at a mall parking lot on June 27, 2022 in Corte Madera, California. The average price for a new electric car has surged 22 percent in the past year as automakers like Tesla, GM and Ford seek to recoup commodity and logistics costs.
Banning New Electric Vehicle Sales
Several states in the country made an effort to move toward banning the sale of gasoline vehicles, including California and New York. According to the filed resolutions, this decision was done to achieve climate targets.
But despite these efforts, one state wants to go in the opposite direction. Based on a report from Engadget, Wyoming's Legislature wants to ban new electric vehicle sales by 2035, with support from members of the state's House of Representatives and Senate.
As per the proposed resolution, the state's industry in the oil and gas market has opened doors to jobless residents and contributed revenue to the coffers. Additionally, Senator Jim Anderson, who led the resolution, stated that Wyoming lacks charging infrastructure within the state.
This would make the use of electric vehicles impractical as the state would be needing to build a massive amount of new power generation to keep up with the "misadventure of electric vehicles." Tesla currently holds the largest DC fast-charging network in the world with 40,000 and counting.
Senate Joint Resolution 4 is calling residents and several businesses in the state to decrease and lessen the sale and purchase of EVs voluntarily to keep the goal running, which is to phase out the sales entirely by 2035.
According to the resolution, it would also have deleterious impacts on the communities of the state and will be detrimental to the economy. The ability of the country would also efficiently engage in commerce.
Democrats vs. Republicans
Once this is passed, this resolution would be entirely symbolic as it sends a message to advocates and activists. Rolling Stone reported that Wyoming Republicans think that this is important, even if only to troll Democratic states who favored EVs.
Meanwhile, GOP Co-Sponsor Senator Brian Boner stated, "I'm interested in making sure that the solutions that some folks want to the so-called climate crisis are actually practical in real life. I just don't appreciate when other states try to force technology that isn't ready."
He also acknowledged the trolling nature of the resolution and said that "one might even say tongue-in-cheek" but he added that this issue deserves some public discussion.
Wyoming ranked eighth among the other states in crude oil production in 2021. The state produced 85.43 million barrels of crude oil.
Teslarati reported that President Joe Biden has been focusing on EVs and creating several charging infrastructures in the country. By 2023, the global EV market will grow as predicted by research groups, with the new study expecting that the market size values at $823.74 billion by 2040.
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