Green vs White HOV decal sticker debate. Sorry Volt and Prius, no discount toll for you.

My wife drives a C-Max Energi with the Green HOV decals. I drive a Fiat 500E with the White HOV carpool sticker. They both are entitled to be in HOV diamond carpool lanes but there is one big difference. Her car, along with the Plugin Prius, Chevy Volt, and Fusion Energi are not allowed to drive on the Bay Bridge with the discounted toll of $2.50. They're suppose to pay $6 during commute time yet I see Plugin Priuses drive through the carpool toll everyday.

There is clearly confusion and no one knows. So if you are coming from Google or a search result with the phrase "Green HOV Bridge Toll", hopefully this page will set the record straight. Sorry Plugin Prius, you won't like what you will read.

People were confused because the old Caltrans 511 web page made references to white and yellow stickers. Since the yellow stickers expired, people thought that page was out-dated and assumed green stickers had the same privileges as white. This not a Green vs White HOV sticker debate, this is just the facts. Green HOV decals for plugin hybrids are not allowed to get discount toll as you will read on this page.

The California Clean Air Resource Board is the authority on this. On their FAQ, page:
http://www.arb.ca.gov/msprog/carpool/carpool.htm#FAQ

White stickers are defined as ILEV cars. Meaning, PURE Electric cars meet the Federal Inherently Low Emission standards. A Volt and Plugin Prius are TZEV, Transitional zero emissions. That is the key difference and those initials and definitions are very important in the eyes of the law.

So now, you must read the actual toll pages of the various bridges and you will see, it explicity states those benefits only apply to ILEV cars.AKA White Sticker cars like my Fiat 500E, Tesla Model S, RAV4EV or Nissan Leaf.

The Golden Gate Bridge goes as far as actually stating the decal color and who gets what.

http://goldengatebridge.org/tolls_traffic/toll_rates.php

The other bridges - Dumbarton, Carquinez,San Mateo, Oakland-SF Bay Bridge use the more technical terms. This is why people are confused. It doesn't specifically say the color and they don't use the blanket term, "clean air decal qualifies." Rather, the pages are very specific to the rules that the benefits only extend to ILEV cars with decals.

Links:

https://www.bayareafastrak.org/static/facilities/dumbarton.shtml
https://www.bayareafastrak.org/static/facilities/sm.shtml
https://www.bayareafastrak.org/vector/static/facilities/carq.shtml
https://www.bayareafastrak.org/vector/static/facilities/sfob.shtml

All those pages have this which I highlighted.

So there you have it. All these bridges are operated by the Bay Area Toll Authority.
On their website, http://bata.mtc.ca.gov/tolls/schedule.htm

INHERENTLY-LOW-EMISSION VEHICLES

• The Bay Area Toll Authority grants reduced rate passage on the above bridges to inherently-low-emission vehicles with DMV-issued decals, such as electric cars, that use FasTrak® to pay the toll.
• The reduced rate is the same as the reduced rate for high-occupancy vehicles and applies only during the hours when the reduced rate applies to high-occupancy vehicles.

So you can see, it is very clear what the rules are. ILEV cars like the Leaf and Fiat 500E get the discount. TZEV classified cars such as the Plugin Prius (PIP) are violating toll fare and those owners may not know it.

Both class of vehicles have the right to be in the Carpool lane but the problem is some of the toll lanes are physically isolated and the meter works on fastrak.  Once your Plugin Prius or Chevy Volt gets to the fastrak toll, you don't have the option of switching to the normal toll meter without breaking a lot traffic violations; going over white lines and physical obstructions. As the famous KRON reporter, Stanley Roberts would say, you'd be "Behaving Badly."

Ford C-Max Energi Plug-in Hybrid. An observation from a geeky gearhead.

I'm into fast cars. I'm into European luxury and sporty cars. I love cars in general. You can call me a gearhead. My wife is into practicality. She recently got one of those brand new Ford plug-in hybrids, the C-Max Energi. This is completely out of left field for me. The picture you see above is the average MPG of driving roughly 40 miles over a period of two days. Even as a gearhead, I can totally appreciate that 80 MPG number I am seeing above.

This is not my kind of car I typically look into. Politically correct and green trendy. The visual exterior won't turn heads. The handling and drive characteristics is nothing to rave about.  I'm currently in the market for a mid-life crisis sports car so this is the polar opposite of what I look into.  However, the C-Max Energi is already growing on me. I'm starting to really like it. It is also packed with a lot of gadgetry and electronics. This blog is not going to be a full on review of any sorts. I'm just going to give my readers my impression of a car that I will driving 20-30% of the time.

Just look at how cool the plugin port is. The blue surrounds shows you how far along your charging is. The outer edge of the port lights up fully to indicate the charge status.