It’s already been thought that the electric vehicle (EV) market would be held back simply due to a lack of public charging points, and insufficient availability of power, especially in the UK’s energy networks.
However, recent findings from car manufacturers, analysts and energy companies, have shown that the industry is actually being hampered by a complete lack of available models.
Plenty Of Power
The Platform for Electromobility, whose multiple members include – Tesla, SolarPower Europe, Transport & Environment, Wind Europe, Renault-Nissan, and the London EV Company – have recently revealed research, which suggests there are plenty of electric vehicle chargers to meet the demand for the number of EVs currently on the roads, in the majority of countries.
According to the analysis, there are around six EVs for each charging point, which is almost double the recommendations suggested by the European commission – that proposed ten electric cars per point would be sufficient. And based on infrastructure reviews in Europe, charging availability and power is predicted to keep pace with electric car production until 2020 at the very least.
Lack of available power has been labelled a falsehood by analysts – and Greg Archer, director of the clean vehicles team at Transport & Environment, has stated that “The car industry has deliberately suppressed the market…” and that they wanted to “…create the impression they would love to sell more electric cars but there just isn’t the charging points out there.”
Not Enough Electric Vehicles
Criticism has been levelled at carmakers, due to the relatively small number of fully electric car models that have been launched in the last few years.
With only twenty electric vehicle (EV) models currently on sale in Europe versus over four hundred standard petrol and diesel vehicles, there’s currently not much choice available for consumers. Plus certain EV models require extensive waiting times due to limited supplies.
This isn’t due to lack of consumer demand, as according to stats published by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders – EV sales have hugely increased over the last few years, to a record high of almost four thousand models registered per month last year.
Also, thanks to increased government and private investment, the number of charging points has dramatically risen in the UK – leaping from hundreds back in 2011, to thousands by 2017. It’s thought that as much as 1.9% of the UK’s total new car market is now represented by electric cars.
The motor industry is expected to respond further, and currently there are plans for up to thirteen EV models to launch this year – including the Jaguar i-Pace and Nissan Leaf. Even more models are predicted to launch and go on sale during 2019.
