The European plug-in electric vehicle market registered a record 77,000 vehicles in December (+88%!), with the Dutch market most helping to pull the market up. Fully electric vehicles (+91% year over year) grew a bit faster than plug-in hybrids (+81%), with the powertrain breakdown becoming even more friendly to fully electric vehicles (68% to 32% in December, versus 64% to 36% in 2019).
The head of Subaru says the only electric cars Americans want to buy are made by Tesla. But his company will only sell electric cars by 2035. By then, it will be too late.
Led by the Tesla Model 3, December had an amazing 22,983 plug-in registrations, a three-fold increase compared to the same month last year, finally beating one of the oldest records in modern EV history, the 15,879 units sold in the Netherlands in December 2016.
Human brains are funny. We have a very hard time seeing past this moment. Even when we plan for things, it’s hard to genuinely put our minds in the place we’re planning to be in the mid to long term.
Sweden probably isn’t one of the first countries that come to mind when talking about electric vehicle leaders, but plug-in vehicles have a higher market share there than in almost any other country in the world. In 2019, 11% of auto sales were sales of plug-in vehicles.
2019 is drawing to a close, so let’s take stock of a decade of green mobility progress that started with a handful of startups a decade ago.
The Mercedes-Benz EQC 400 is an all-electric compact luxury SUV powered by two motors. The price was recently announced at $67,900, though the $995 destination and delivery charge is not included. The EQC’s EPA-estimated range is 220 miles | 354 kilometers per charge and the WLTP estimate is 259 miles | 417 kilometers.
The French plug-in electric vehicle (PEV) market had 5,540 registrations in November, with fully electric vehicles (BEVs) dropping 10% year over year (YoY), to 3,201 units. However, plug-in hybrids (PHEVs) took the fast lane and were up 80%.
What caught readers’ eyes the most on CleanTechnica last week? That would be the new Tesla Backup Gateway 2, which looks like a mini Powerwall; a titillating study on EV total cost of ownership in the UK that Bank of American Merrill Lynch conducted and shared with CleanTechnica; and a commentary on Tesla’s revenue growth juxtaposed against Tesla critics’ seemingly never-ending pessimism, which is typically very misplaced.
What is happening in the Netherlands is illustrative of what is going to happen in the surrounding countries. The key to understanding this is a European phenomenon (tax loophole) — company cars for private use.
