The IRS Commercial Clean Vehicle Credit offers a tax credit of up to $40,000 for US businesses and tax-exempt organizations that buy a qualified commercial clean vehicle (an EV, PHEV or fuel cell vehicle). The IRS’s list of eligible manufacturers includes some 60 vehicle brands.

But wait, there’s more. As Lightning eMotors, whose medium-duty commercial EVs have now been certified as eligible for the credit, explains, there are many other federal and state incentive programs, and some are “stackable,” meaning that they can be combined with the IRS credit. According to Lightning, in some cases, taking advantage of all available incentives “can reduce the cost of an electric vehicle to nearly free.”

“The ability to stack the various grant, rebate and credit programs is designed to support accelerated electric vehicle adoption and help the market reach critical mass faster,” said Nick Bettis, VP of Marketing and Sales Operations for Lightning eMotors. “For example, a Type A school bus may be obtained by a school district or operator at essentially no cost and be operated with significantly lower costs as well. To provide the best value to our customers, our sales team has been helping them optimize their EV fleet purchases with the various funding programs for several years.”

Lightning has provided a handy list of some of the programs currently available to commercial EV buyers:

• Federal Transit Administration (FTA) Low- and No-Emissions Vehicle Program for transit agencies
• Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Clean School Bus Program
• Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Airport Zero Emissions Vehicle and Infrastructure Pilot Program
• California’s Hybrid and Zero-Emission Truck and Bus Voucher Incentive Project (HVIP)
• Colorado Clean Electric School Bus Program
• Colorado Clean Fleet Vehicle & Technology Grant Program
• New Jersey Zero-Emission Incentive Program (NJZIP)
• New York City Clean Trucks Program
• New York Truck Voucher Incentive Program (NYTVIP)

More information is available on Lightning’s Grants and Incentives page.

Another handy resource is the Rocky Mountain Institute’s Decarbonizing Industry Resource Tool (DIRT), which helps companies discover state and federal financial incentives that may be applicable to their heavy industry and transport projects.

Source: Lightning eMotors