Joanne Nova
Joanne Nova is a prize-winning science graduate in molecular biology.
Doubts are spreading about the “prospects of electric cars”
Sales of electric vehicles in Germany slumped 37 per cent in July compared to sales one year ago.
It’s not that people don’t want a new car: they just prefer a fossil-fueled one. Sales of normal cars rose seven per cent in the same period.
Electric Car Sales Plummet 37% in Germany as Slump Deepens
By Wilfried Eckl-Dorna, Bloomberg
“The ramp-up of e-mobility is proving to be unsustainable so far,” Constantin Gall, a consultant at EY, said of the German sales results. “The market has lost all momentum, and many customers doubt the prospects of electric cars.”
The slowdown leaves the auto industry exposed after investing billions in the ramp-up of the technology. VW, Europe’s biggest automaker, said last week it had cut capacity at high-cost plants in Germany and also might change the timing of its ramp-up in battery production.
EVs made up 20 per cent of new car sales in Germany this time last year, but that market share has now shrunk to 13 per cent. This is not the way a raging new lifesaving technology takes over the planet.
In Sweden, EV sales are down 15 per cent, and in Switzerland, they’re down by 19 per cent. In Australia, sales have fallen by about 17 per cent in the last six months. Australians bought about 100,000 cars in July, but only 6,700 of them were pure EVs, down from 8,000 earlier this year.
Reading these very bitter tea leaves, Volkswagen has decided to delay the new electric Golf by a year and a half and keep its old fossil-fueled Golf around until 2035. It will now only go out of production when combustion engines are banned in the EU (if that actually happens).
This would be but a minor market statistic were it not for the grandiose expectations of Western governments and the billions of dollars taken from the workers in order to help the rich get an electric toy and “better weather”.
This article was originally published by CFACT.
