Changing math for EVs?

Federal incentives for vehicles such as the battery-powered Tesla Model S and Chevrolet Bolt — which are as much as $7,500 — could be cut or eliminated to help make good on Donald Trump’s campaign pledge to reduce federal spending, says AutoPacific analyst Dave Sullivan.

And that could alter the business model for zero-emissions vehicles, Sullivan says, even if the powerful California Air Resources Board doesn’t dial back its ZEV mandate, which has been adopted by nine other states.

The loss of even part of the federal incentive, Sullivan says, could drive up sticker prices and ding sales of electric vehicles, just as the first generation of “affordable” long-range EVs begin to reach the market

However, the dramatic drop in prices for lithium ion batteries might give automakers some breathing room. Battery costs have plunged from about $300 per kilowatt-hour in 2011 to around $145 today. And they could bottom out to around $100 per kilowatt hour by 2022, General Motors believes.

Beyond that, Trump’s biggest influence on product may come from his pledge to invest in infrastructure improvements. Modernizing the nation’s crumbling roads and bridges provides an opportunity to build a transportation system designed to work seamlessly with autonomous vehicles.

In the short term, automakers’ product-development plans are not likely to change much, since vehicles and powertrains launching between now and around 2018 are paid for and queued up for production.

“Regulations are as they are today, and we are going to continue to work to meet them,” said Michael O’Brien, Hyundai Motor America’s vice president of corporate and product planning.