USPS: Funds realized by auctioning EVs and infrastructure would be negligible, ROI only possible with intended use. Image: USPS
By: FEDweek StaffThe USPS has objected to “the real and foreseeable damage that would be caused by arbitrarily scrapping one part of our long-term vehicle strategy”—purchasing electric vehicles and the needed charging stations—set to be included in the budget reconciliation bill in the Senate.
Committee language for the bill, set for floor voting soon, would re quire the GSA to “take possession of all of our electric vehicles and all of those vehicles’ supporting infrastructure and then put it all up for auction . . . This is a significant and costly change that will undo more than 10 years of planning and work on our delivery fleet replacement” and will “seriously cripple our ability to replace an aging and obsolete delivery fleet,” the USPS said in a letter to senators.
A summary from the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee projects a $1 billion saving from rescinding funding authority for purchasing vehicles and the related infrastructure under the Inflation Reduction Act enacted during the Biden presidency. However, the letter estimates that USPS would have to spend $1 billion on new vehicles in any event to replace those aging out of service, “with another $500 million in infrastructure rendered useless.”
“The funds realized by auctioning the vehicles and infrastructure would be negligible. Much of infrastructure is literally buried under parking lots, and there is no market for used charging equipment”; the money already spent on charging stations “can only yield a return on investment by being put to their intended use,” it says.
Similarly, many of the vehicles are custom-designed for postal delivery purposes—for example, with right-hand drives—and selling them “would likely yield significantly less than even their undepreciated book value,” it says.
Separately, an inspector general report has called on the USPS to improve the security of charging stations already deployed. An audit raised issues with both physical controls, such as security cameras not working or absent altogether, and electronic controls, such as vulnerability to unauthorized use.
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