the government will lower the threshold for triggering the malus in 2019

The Ministry of Ecological and Solidarity Transition and the Ministry of Transport are expected to announce , Friday, July 20, a new drop in the threshold triggering an ecological penalty when buying a new private vehicle. In 2019, this incremental additional tax on the registration certificate will be triggered for vehicles emitting 117 grams of CO ₂ per kilometer traveled, compared to 120 grams currently.

This announcement should be made in the context of a presentation by Ministers Elisabeth Borne and Nicolas Hulot of the clean mobility and air quality component of the future mobility guidelines law which will be presented to the Council of Ministers at the start of the school year.

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The relevant ministries have indicated that the ecological bonus, which is now reserved for 100% electric vehicles (6,000 euros within the limit of 27% of the acquisition cost for a car), should be maintained at high level.

Successive declines

This ecological bonus-malus system, invented in 2008 in the wake of the Grenelle de l'environnement, is not at its first drop. When it was created, it was triggered from 161 grams of CO2. And the hardening of recent years has been stronger than that of next year. We have indeed increased from 131 grams in 2016 to 127 grams in 2017 and 120 grams in 2018.

Today this surcharge starts at 50 euros if the car you buy emits 120 grams of CO ₂ per kilometer traveled (a Renault Espace diesel for example), then gram increase in grams to reach 10 500 euros over 184 grams (a Jaguar XE supercharged petrol for example).

What may complicate the case is that this extension of the malus comes at a time when the approval is changing, since we pbad from a so-called NEDC standard to a new certification called WLTP, more demanding and close to real conditions driving. A car whose consumption (hence CO emissions ₂ ) is 120 in NEDC will mathematically see an increase in WLTP. The government has indicated that the hardening will continue on the same trend after applying the new standard, but taking into account this change in thermometer. It remains to know the details of this tax adjustment, eagerly awaited by the entire automotive industry.