Europe Electric Car Sales Booming
Originally published on EV Obsession.
The European electric vehicle (EV) market is continuing to see strong growth, based on registrations during March — with roughly 18,000 units registered, blowing past the old monthly record (set in December 2013) for the old continent. The old record was 14,197 units registered.
As it stands, more than 36,000 EVs have been registered in the European market this year — putting the market (if things continue this way) roughly on track to top 150,000 units in 2015.
Note that these numbers are not perfect. They don’t actually cover all European countries, and they include a lot of estimates, but much of the data is very usefully gathered (or estimated) through the painstaking work of José Pontes, and it helps to show what the European EV market looks like — quite different from the US market.
The market during March was dominated by the Mitsubishi Outlander Plug-In, which saw 4,306 units sold. This is a vehicle that still isn’t even on the US market.
The Nissan LEAF saw good continuing sales as well, with 3,300 units sold — which is, more or less, a record with regards to units sold in a single month (in the European market) for a purely electric vehicle.
The Tesla Model S continued to do well, as well — with a personal record of 2,584 units sold (registered) in March. And the Renault Zoe and Volkswagen e-Golf followed behind with good sales as well — with 1,343 and 1,104 units sold, respectively.
Altogether, the rise of the Nissan Leaf and the Tesla Model S was notable — each managing to gain market share and rise in the rankings, the LEAF up to the #2 spot, and the Model S up to #3.
The year-to-date numbers (again, from the EV Sales blog) tell a similar story, with the first three positions being identical. Additionally, the BMW i3 managed to rise to the #6 position, and the Audi A3 e-Tron to #8.
Interestingly, the Nissan e-NV200/Evalia actually rose 6 spots, to take the #11 position — seeing more than half of its year-to-date sales in just one month (March).
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It is crazy that Mitz is not selling the Outlander PHEV in the USA. They must be production constrained because it is sure to be a big hit in the USA too.
I believe that’s the issue. But not sure.
What’s the growth?
January +140%, February +70%, March +95%. Quarter 1 +99%. Compared to the same month/period in 2014 of course.
For the first quarter 1,04% of all cars sold in Europe were EVs. In March 1,17% of all cars sold were EVs.
Honestly, I excluded 2014 because I know that Jose’s numbers have developed over time as he has gathered more sources, and I don’t know how that affects “growth.”
Additionally, I tried for awhile to do these from original data from Germany, France, the Netherlands, Norway, the UK, and other countries — none of them offer comprehensive (for all models) data. The ones that come close lump electric versions of gasmobiles with the gasmobiles (e.g., e-Golf with Golf). Germany actually did include the breakdowns for awhile but stopped (I think it was about a year ago, but forget now).
Long story short: take these numbers as broad strokes hinting at the general reality (very useful in that regard) but don’t trust that all of the numbers are accurate and I’d say that it’d be best not to trust the growth rates until reporting becomes more specific.
I keep my own records and the growth numbers should be fairly accurate since no large markets are missing. But as you said it’s good for guidance but shouldn’t be looked at as absolute numbers and perfect statistics.
And it’s great that you publish these articles with journalistic integrity and trying to keep away from getting to inaccurate numbers. We as commenters can fill in the gaps with the numbers that would be considered too uncertain and not possible to fact check.
You do a good and serious work as usual, unfortunately not all the other writers at CleanTechnica reach up to the same high standard.
a BMW i8 FLEW by me on the AutoBahn(A3) this weekend. Had to be going 220 KM/h. Very cool.
Nice. I saw one near an expressway in Chicago last week. They look like they’re from the future.
Nice 🙂
I have not seen one at that speed yet, but I have seen a lot of i8. Gotta be at least 10. And even more i3 (something like 20?). Perks of living in BMW city.
Wow. Haha. Which city is that, Munich?
Yes Munich.
I’m also seeing prototype/test cars from BMW (and sometimes MINI) every few days.
They look like that: http://blog.caranddriver.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/BMW-3-series-hybrid-prototype-spy-photo-2.jpg
Most of the time only the front, the back or some part is covered. But just last week I saw one that was 100% covered 🙂
I’ve got a pretty fun video featuring one in Germany, but it’s not moving. Will hopefully publish before too long. 😀
Mitsubishi rocking that hard?!
Ok I did a little research. It’s basically the first good SUV version of the Chevy Volt.
Up until now any plug-in hybrid or hybrid SUV has kind of sucked compared to sedans.
It’s wonderful to see the fantastic growth rate of electric vehicles in Europe and worldwide. Consumers are embracing them for so many reasons, including how great they are for the environment and the fact that they are so fun to drive…
The Leaf EU sales seem to be double of the montly US sales even with the much higher price. How can that be?
Norway, + decent sales in several other countries (France, UK, Germany…)
Renault Germany just slashed the price of the Renault Zoe by 5000€ bringing it down to 16.500€ (+battery rent)
http://www.renault.de/top-angebote/aktuelle-angebote.jsp?model=zoe
Valid until 30th of June.
Wow, thanks, worth a story!
Cool!
Renault is really trying to sell their EVs right now.
They also offer 48h free test rides for the Zoe, Twizzy and Kangoo ZE.
http://www.renault.de/renault-welt/aktionen/renault-e-autos-48-stunden-gratis-testen/
I also discovered this map were you can filter for free charging stations.
http://www.goingelectric.de/stromtankstellen/
And ofcourse this:
Munich wants to use 30mio € to encourage electric mobility for businesses.
http://www.sueddeutsche.de/muenchen/elektromobilitaet-in-muenchen-mehr-stromer-in-der-stadt-1.2429793
It’s gaining momentum slowly, but steadily.
Looks like EV sales in Europe is outselling US and this month Tesla has sold lot more. Wonderful. These charts are interesting.
I’ve just put these number in an Excel file. If you multiply the sales figures with the battery size in kWh, you get the amount of ‘rolling energy storage’ sold.
For March 2015, Tesla sold 219,640 kWh.
Nissan Leaf: 79,200 kWh.
Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV: 51,672 kWh.
Renault Zoe: 29,546 kWh.
VW e-Golf: 26,717 kWh.
BMW i3: 19,844 kWh.
Nissan e-NV200: 12,192 kWh.
TOTAL: 219,171 kWh.
So when we look at kWh sold, Model S outsells Nissan Leaf, Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV, Renault Zoe, VW e-Golf, BMW i3 and Nissan e-NV200. COMBINED.
All because of build out of Quickcharger infrastructure? Put that on a comparison graph. Why I haven’t bought yet. Not much infrastructure, where I roll.
In Canada Toyota can not supply enough Highlander hybrid models for the market, even with a higher price.