Tesla Cybertruck qualifies for the $7,500 EV tax credit

In updates Friday, the U.S. EPA confirmed that some variations of the Tesla Cybertruck will qualify for the EV tax credit score—no less than for these fashions delivered in 2023.

As revealed simply over per week in the past, the Tesla Cybertruck will arrive in $79,990 All-Wheel Drive (dual-motor) kind, with a $99,990 Cyberbeast (tri-motor) efficiency mannequin. A single-motor Rear-Wheel Drive mannequin is because of arrive in 2025. 

That’s the place info posted on the EPA’s tax-credit page—and noticed by accomplice website CarsDirect—turns into a bit complicated. The Cyberbeast is listed as certified for the $7,500 EV tax credit score, with an MSRP restrict of $80,000. 

EPA signifies Tesla Cybertruck qualifies for $7,500 EV tax credit score. – 12/2023

Nowhere else on the EPA website is a mannequin that begins properly above $80,000 listed as certified. Neither is it doubtless that Tesla intends to decrease the Cyberbeast under $80,000 for deliveries earlier than the tip of 2023, which is the time interval for the EPA’s present record. Inexperienced Automobile Stories has reached out to the EPA for clarification; Tesla doesn’t reply press inquiries.

The pricing isn’t the one factor that doesn’t fairly measure as much as Tesla’s initially promised $39,900 begin. Whereas a spread of “500+ miles” had been instructed on the Cybertruck idea reveal in 2019, the production Tesla Cybertruck arriving greater than 4 years later returns an estimated 340 EPA miles in All-Wheel Drive kind. 

2025 Tesla Cybertruck – Courtesy of Tesla, Inc.

The intense aspect of that is that by way of some lean engineering selections Tesla has managed to get that vary from a reported battery capability of simply 123 kwh—extra vary than the Ford F-150 Lightning from much less battery, as an illustration. Alternatively, getting something near the claimed 500 miles means choosing a “vary extender” battery that occupies a part of the cargo field, enabling as much as 470 miles.

It’s not stunning although that the Cybertruck makes the reduce for the tax credit score, which has been revamped round emphasizing American-made EVs with home sourcing. 

Tesla Battery Day vertical integration overview

Because it underscored in its Battery Day again in 2020, properly earlier than Biden’s EV coverage, Tesla is striving to make batteries and the entire provide chain for them a part of a vertically built-in—and localized—provide chain. The Cybertruck’s 4680 cylindrical cells are U.S.-made, and the Cybertruck is made in Austin.

These fashions aren’t but listed by the EPA for effectivity or vary scores, they usually would possibly by no means be till lighter single-motor variations attain the market. Fashions with a gross car weight ranking above 8,500 kilos aren’t required to record these numbers on the time of sale. 

Not all Teslas will make the reduce for the tax credit score, although. Tesla has already instructed that the bottom LFP model of the Mannequin 3 gained’t qualify for the credit score in 2024. That’s as a result of, no less than for now, it depends on foreign-made cells.

2023 Tesla Mannequin 3

Final month, the federal authorities launched the most recent baked-in section of the credit score, as specified below the Inflation Discount Act. It eliminates the credit score for EVs containing battery elements equipped by or assembled by a “overseas entity of concern” (together with China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia). 

In response to that language, an exclusion extends to company subsidies which can be working elsewhere which can be majority-controlled by companies primarily based in entities of concern. So disqualified fashions would possibly—relying on interpretation—embrace U.S.-made Volvo and Polestar EVs (majority owned by China’s Geely) and Europe-made batteries from China’s CATL.

In 2025, the rule is because of get a stage deeper but—to cowl important minerals that originate from or have been processed in a overseas entity of concern. Tesla’s vertical integration and management of its provide chain are more likely to pay handsomely.