Chris Van Hollen: “I would like to engage my friend the chairman of the Finance Committee, Senator Wyden, in a colloquy. One of the many…”

“I would like to engage my friend the chairman of the Finance Committee, Senator Wyden, in a colloquy. One of the many vital investments made in the Inflation Reduction Act to reduce energy costs and confront the climate crisis is the qualified commercial clean vehicle credit. This provides a tax credit of up to $40,000 for qualified heavy commercial electric vehicles, or up to $7,500 for qualified commercial electric vehicles weighing less than 14,000 pounds, which includes both trucks and mobile machinery. Mobile machinery is a vehicle that is unrelated to transportation, such as a forklift or bulldozer. The qualified commercial clean vehicle credit utilizes an existing statutory definition of mobile machinery, the purpose of which is to provide for an exemption from the excise tax on heavy trucks that is deposited into the highway trust fund. The new application of the mobile machinery definition will raise novel questions about which types of vehicles qualify as mobile machinery, in cases where the determination was not necessary in the context of the excise tax on heavy trucks. One such case is commercial lawn mowers, most of which currently have gas-powered engines that are a significant source of pollution.…”