Month: August 2022

Enlarge / Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.V.) speaking to reporters in the Hart Senate Office building on August 1, 2022, in Washington, DC. (credit: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Among the many provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) of 2022 is a revamp of the federal tax credit for electric vehicles. The changes would restore the eligibility of Tesla and General Motors and includes a smaller credit for the purchase of a used EV. Despite this, the bill is running into opposition from the auto industry, and most of the EVs currently on sale would no longer qualify. But the bill's author, Senator Joe Manchin, has little time for complaints.

Currently, almost all new plug-in vehicles qualify for the plug-in electric drive vehicle credit, as laid out in Internal Revenue Code section 30D, introduced on the basis that the high cost of a lithium-ion traction battery is the main impediment to electric vehicles reaching price parity with their gasoline- or diesel-powered alternatives.

The credit is based on battery capacity. Starting at $2,917 for a plug-in vehicle with a 5 kWh pack, the credit increases by $417 per kWh to a maximum of $7,500. But there's a penalty for sales success—once an automaker has sold 200,000 qualifying plug-in vehicles, the credit begins to sunset. So far, this has only happened to Tesla and General Motors, both of which triggered the process in 2018.

Enlarge / Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.V.) speaking to reporters in the Hart Senate Office building on August 1, 2022, in Washington, DC. (credit: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Among the many provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) of 2022 is a revamp of the federal tax credit for electric vehicles. The changes would restore the eligibility of Tesla and General Motors and includes a smaller credit for the purchase of a used EV. Despite this, the bill is running into opposition from the auto industry, and most of the EVs currently on sale would no longer qualify. But the bill's author, Senator Joe Manchin, has little time for complaints.

Currently, almost all new plug-in vehicles qualify for the plug-in electric drive vehicle credit, as laid out in Internal Revenue Code section 30D, introduced on the basis that the high cost of a lithium-ion traction battery is the main impediment to electric vehicles reaching price parity with their gasoline- or diesel-powered alternatives.

The credit is based on battery capacity. Starting at $2,917 for a plug-in vehicle with a 5 kWh pack, the credit increases by $417 per kWh to a maximum of $7,500. But there's a penalty for sales success—once an automaker has sold 200,000 qualifying plug-in vehicles, the credit begins to sunset. So far, this has only happened to Tesla and General Motors, both of which triggered the process in 2018.

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  The OnePlus 10T comes in green and black.

Four months after the launch of the OnePlus 10 Pro, OnePlus is back with a new device, the OnePlus 10T. After we beat up the OnePlus 10 earlier this year for having a high price, the OnePlus 10T looks like a decent correction: It's $649, $250 cheaper than the $899 OnePlus 10 Pro.

Let's look for the missing $250 in the spec sheet: The OnePlus 10T is slightly faster than the more expensive OnePlus 10 Pro, thanks to the Snapdragon 8+ Gen1 SoC. This has a minor 10 percent faster MHz boost over the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 and turns in benchmark scores right around that amount. That 10 percent speed boost finally brings Qualcomm's 2022 CPU performance back up to the level of its 2021 chip—previously it was a bit slower.

The phone still has 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage (and a new 16GB/256GB tier for $100 more). There's still an in-screen fingerprint reader and a USB-C port. The battery is 4 percent smaller at 4800 mAh instead of 5000 mAh, and the wireless charging is gone. The phone doesn't support Wi-Fi 6E (just Wi-Fi 6), and it sounds like the cameras are all a tier lower, with the phone now sporting a 50 MP Sony IMX776, and then a just-for-fun 8 MP ultrawide and a 2 MP macro camera.