April 5, 2024 - On March 14, 2024, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) held a public work group to discuss the current status of the E-Bike Incentive Project and get feedback on two possible implementation schedules.
The most exciting piece of new information at the work group was the confirmation that a total of $31 million will be available for the E-Bike Incentive Project in 2024. That’s the original $10 million allocation from the legislature, plus $3 million CARB added, plus $18 million CARB put in its current budget as part of its clean transportation programs. That should be enough to fund around 15,000 incentives. It’s still not enough to meet the likely demand, but it’s considerably more than the original budget.
Also the California vouchers are stackable with local e-bike incentive programs. For example, if you got a $1,000 voucher through the California program and a $500 incentive from your local utility, you could apply both toward the purchase of one bike, giving you $1,500 toward your purchase. Some local organizations reported that they are designing their programs to coincide with the statewide launch, so recipients can stack vouchers.
CARB floated two implementation plans: make all funds available on the launch date or roll out the vouchers in three stages, one in each of the remaining quarters of 2024. CalBike favors a phased rollout for voucher distribution. This has been found to increase equity in other programs, most notably the very successful Denver e-bike program.
At the work group, CARB reported that the soft launch is underway at the moment and going well and that the incentive availability timeline would be announced in April.
Read the full release here.
