Global EV sales up 74%

Global EV/PHEV sales continued to expand very rapidly in May, by 74% year-on-year.

In absolute terms, sales are up 7-fold in 4 and a half years.  The chart below uses a logarithmic scale, so a continuous rate of increase would produce a straight line.  As you can see, sales have grown at close to a straight line, though there was a slowdown of sorts in 2016.

As a percentage of all global car/light truck sales, EV/PHEV sales are now 2.6%.  That's up from 0.4% in January 2014, just 4.5 years ago.

The the growth rate continues at extraordinary levels.  The chart below seems to suggest that the growth rate is slowing, but that's really just an arithmetical effect of the slowdown in 2016, which produced a peak in the year-on-year growth in January this year.

At the current growth rate, EVs and PHEVs will reach 100% of total global EV/PHEV sales in just 7 years.  Of course, the growth will slow as we get closer to 100%, but it's abundantly clear the shift to 100% (or near) is going to happen long before 2040 or 50, where most consensus estimates believe their market share in new sales will still be below 50%.

➥  As ever, source of basic EV/PHEV data is Inside EVs, with my seasonal adjustment and my smoothing.