The Senate has approved on third and final reading a bill seeking to grant incentives to the manufacturers or importers of alternative fuel vehicles.

Recto, who also sponsored the bill, said the enactment of Senate Bill No. 2856 or the Alternative Fuel Vehicles Incentives Act into law, will usher an era of cheaper, cleaner cars that will reduce the country's dependency on the use of fossil fuels.

"Every hour, our motor vehicles consume millions of liters of gasoline. Every hour, 2,200 metric tons of carbon dioxide is pumped into the air, a carbon footprint which requires the planting of 56,000 trees to absorb all that poison, every hour we spend P53,000 to treat pollution-related diseases and to compensate for productivity losses and every hour, four Filipinos die from dirty air," Recto said.

The challenge for the country, he said, is to improve the motor vehicles so it will spew less poison and bleed less foreign exchange.

Under the proposed legislation, fiscal and non-fiscal incentives shall be granted to the importation and manufacture of electric, hybrid and other vehicles using alternative sources of energy such as, but not limited to, solar, wind, hydrogen fuel cell, compressed natural gas or liquefied natural gas, methane and liquefied petroleum gas.

He said the manufacturers or assemblers of completely knocked down units of alternative fuel vehicles (AFVs), including the conversion of vehicles into electric, hybrid and other AFVs, shall be exempted from payment of excise taxes and duties for nine years.

He said manufacturers and assemblers are exempt from the payment of the value added tax for the purchase and importation of raw materials, spare parts, components and capital equipment used in the manufacture or assembly of AFVs for also nine years.

Importers of completely build units of AFV shall be exempt from payment of excise taxes and duties for nine years while owners of AFVs are exempt from the payment of the Motor Vehicle User's Charge or the MVUC upon registration of their vehicles, according to Recto.

He said non-fiscal incentives granted under the proposed measure include priority in the registration and issuances of plate numbers and priority in franchise applications for public utility vehicles.

The bill was authored by former Senator Juan Miguel Zubiri, Miriam Defensor - Santiago, Trillanes, Recto, Lapid, Bongbong Marcos, Loren Legarda and Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III. It was co-sponsored by Legarda.