2020: The year of the electric car

From The Guardian:

Europe’s carmakers are gearing up to make 2020 the year of the electric car, according to automotive analysts, with a wave of new models launching as the world’s biggest manufacturers scramble to lower the carbon dioxide emissions of their products.

Previous electric models have mostly been targeted at niche markets, but 2020 will see the launch of flagship electric models with familiar names, such as the Mini, the Vauxhall Corsa and the Fiat 500.

The number of electric vehicle (EV) models available to European buyers will jump from fewer than 100 to 175 by the end of 2020, according to data firm IHS Markit. By 2025 there will be more than 330, based on an analysis of company announcements.

The new supply will cater to a rapidly expanding market as demand for petrol-powered vehicles gradually recedes. UK EV sales will rise from 3.4% of all vehicles sold in 2019 to 5.5% in 2020 – or from 80,000 this year to 131,000 in 2020 – according to forecasts from Bloomberg New Energy Finance. By 2026 electric vehicle sales will account for a fifth of sales in the UK, the forecasts show.  [EVs+plug-in hybrids+hybrids already make up more than 10% of UK car sales] Similar predictions from LMC Automotive suggest 540,000 electric cars will be sold across the EU in 2020, up from 319,000 over the course of 2019.  [If growth continues at the 60-70% year-on-year growth rate forecast for 2020, EVs will make up 60%+ of sales by 2025, and will easily reach 100% by 2030.]

New European Union rules come into force on 1 January that will heavily penalise carmakers if average carbon dioxide emissions from the cars they sell rise above 95g per kilometre. If carmakers exceed that limit, they will have to pay a fine of €95 (£79) for every gram over the target, multiplied by the total number of cars they sell.

The excess emissions bill would have been £28.6bn on 2018 sales figures, according to analysis by the automotive consultancy Jato Dynamics, illustrating the extent of the change required by carmakers over a short period of time.

Multiple new electric car models will go on sale just in time to qualify for EU regulations. In November the first of Volkswagen’s ID.3 cars rolled off a new electric production line in Zwickau, eastern Germany, that will be able to produce 330,000 vehicles a year by 2021. The first of BMW’s Mini Electric models, made in Oxford, will arrive in showrooms in March. Vauxhall, owned by France’s PSA Group, will start production of its Corsa-e in January, with sales to begin in March.

Consultants at Deloitte estimate the market will reach a tipping point in 2022, when the cost of ownership of an electric car is on par with its internal combustion engine counterparts. Separate research by the International Council on Clean Transportation suggested this was already the case in February in five European countries, including the UK.