I think it's cost.<p>Up to now, EVs have been very very expensive. We are only now starting to see EVs approaching the €20k mark. Al lthe rich folks who are interested in getting an EV got one already. The rest of us still can't afford them. I'm in the market now, but I'll be looking at the 2nd hand market because new is just too rich for my blood.<p>Here in Ireland the grants are also drying up reducing the incentives further.<p>I think this will change pretty soon. As more cheaper new EVs come online, the bottom of the 2nd hand market will drop out. It's a pity that the majority of ev manufacturers are focusing on ultra loaded luxury land-space-ships. Give me a cheap urban transport capsule with 100km range that charges quickly, and I'll be dead happy and probably buy 2.
For me personally (I spoke to others and they mostly agree) the biggest downside is that for "public" charging I pay a 100% premium. My costs at home (I live in a rented apartment with no possibility of charging an EV) for 1kw/h are 0.30€. The average price for charging publicly here are 0.59€. Plus the hassle of having a quadrillion providers for which I would have to check first what the cheapest one at a given charger would be. I have enough inconveniences in my life, won't add another one (especially one that could be easily resolved).
Norway had a little downward bump in sales around the 10-20% market share mark too if I remember correctly. But after going through that speed bump the sales have shot up to 90%+<p>I wonder if it’s kind of necessary to sit on that ~10% level for a while to drive infrastructure investments. And then when infrastructure gets up to a decent level further growth is unlocked. I remember it was a very short timespan where it went from feeling like we had some fast chargers here and there, to it feeling like chargers was absolutely <i>everywhere</i>. I think that does a lot to give people confidence in buying EVs<p>If you look at curves of other technology transitions it doesn’t seem like these kind of bumps or pauses in growth are unusual.
Without tax incentives EVs are far more expensive for people who only drive say 5-10k miles a year.<p>My fuel costs are about 15p/mile in my old rustbucket (45mpg is about 10 miles per litre, £1.50 a litre)<p>An EV will do say 4 miles per kWh, so in theory at 30p/kWh that's 7.5p per mile, half the price.<p>5000 miles a year that's £375 saving with electric. Add in another £160 VED saving (again my old bucket) and that's £500 a year.<p>A bottom of the line Micra is about £13k new. A bottom of the line Leaf is £27k new. A new micra will get better milage and lower VED than my 20 year old one too.
> BYD also saw a slowdown between January and March.<p>Did they, though?<p>> BYD sold 300,114 EVs globally in the first three months of the year, up 13.4% YOY. In April, BYD sold another 134,465 EVs, up 17% over April 2023. Through the first four months of 2024, BYD sold 434,579 electric cars.<p><a href="https://electrek.co/2024/05/15/byd-just-hit-new-weekly-ev-sales-record-2024-china/#:~:text=BYD%20sold%20300%2C114%20EVs%20globally,50%25%20WOW%20to%20around%208%2C000" rel="nofollow">https://electrek.co/2024/05/15/byd-just-hit-new-weekly-ev-sa...</a>.
If EV sales are slowing down, that might be only in a few countries where prices are kept artificially high.<p>In the biggest car market, EVs are hitting sales records:
<a href="https://electrek.co/2024/05/15/byd-just-hit-new-weekly-ev-sales-record-2024-china/" rel="nofollow">https://electrek.co/2024/05/15/byd-just-hit-new-weekly-ev-sa...</a><p>The number of electric cars sold globally in the first three months of this year is roughly equivalent to the number sold in all of 2020. In 2024, electric cars sales in China are projected to leap to about 10 million, accounting for about 45% of all car sales in the country: <a href="https://www.iea.org/news/the-worlds-electric-car-fleet-continues-to-grow-strongly-with-2024-sales-set-to-reach-17-million" rel="nofollow">https://www.iea.org/news/the-worlds-electric-car-fleet-conti...</a>
I won't drive an electric car as long as possible.
Not because they are electric or I have any love at all for cumbustion cars, but because I work in the industry.<p>I see what's inside those things, I see what the plans for the next generation are, and they are a cost-cutters wet dream.<p>They are getting even more over-engineered, fully stuffed of useless, cheap, consumer-standard-manufactured gadgets, with software so unbelievabley shit that wouldn't be allowed to run on anything else, design and engineering teams lead by testosteroned morons - and everything targeted on rent-seeking and commodifying for the quick buck.<p>Seeing the current generation of EVs of many large companies, they will never be environmentally sensible - just because they are all around designed in a way to be basically impossible to be used for more than a couple of years.
EVs are growing everywhere, see Q1 2024 vs Q1 2023[1], slower in EU, compared to other regions. There's a reason for it.<p>Schmidt said German sales were suffering due to subsidy cuts, and because manufacturers are deliberately holding back sales until 2025, when tougher rules on average CO2 emissions come in: <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/apr/23/electric-and-hybrid-car-sales-to-rise-to-new-global-record-in-2024" rel="nofollow">https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/apr/23/electric...</a><p>[1]<a href="https://rhomotion.com/news/q1-2024-over-3-million-electric-vehicles-sold-globally/" rel="nofollow">https://rhomotion.com/news/q1-2024-over-3-million-electric-v...</a>
I think it's like 5G. Yeah, it's running out of steam, the marginal benefit is virtually nonexistent.<p>I personally don't want a ton of tracking and screens in my car. People want to be able to "fill up" in 10 minutes, go wherever they want, and spend less than a thousand dollars on CSR repairs to get them going again. Until that's possible, even with cheaper cars, electric cars will always be an upper middle class social signalling decision.