EV sales have slowed down. That puts pressure on Massachusetts’ climate goals.

Massachusetts wanted a million EVs on the road by 2030. That was always a number on a spreadsheet, not a plan for how actual people buy cars. Now sales have slowed, and suddenly it's a "pressure point" on climate goals rather than what it actually is: the market telling planners something they didn't want to hear.

People aren't rejecting EVs because they hate the planet. They're rejecting them because charging infrastructure is spotty, prices are still high once subsidies fade, and a used Honda gets you where you're going without a range anxiety spreadsheet of your own. None of that shows up in a Beacon Hill target-setting memo, but it shows up on dealer lots.

The instinct now will be to lean harder on mandates, rebates, or penalties to force the number back on track. That's backwards. If the goal only works when government keeps subsidizing the choice, it was never really a market transition, it was a mandate wearing a market costume.

Massachusetts can chase its 2030 number by force if it wants. But arbitrary targets don't bend reality, and pretending a sales slump is a "setback" instead of a signal is how you end up spending years and billions chasing a deadline nobody but planners actually needed.