Electric car approvals Western Europe 1st half

Enlarge image

Not cheaper by the dozen:

Tesla's Model 3 electric sedan is by far the best-selling electric car model in Western Europe

Photo: Stephen Lam / REUTERS

The German Federal Motor Transport Authority reported new records for new registrations of all-electric cars and plug-in hybrids almost every month. The numbers show with regularity how much the "environmental premium" increased in the wake of the corona pandemic is catching on. Thanks to the subsidy, which is shared equally by the state and the car manufacturers, the list price of purely e-cars has fallen by almost 10,000 euros - and brings the new car prices of some models pretty close to similarly equipped models with combustion engines.

For many German car manufacturers, the strong performance of their new e-models in their home market is a success that they like to advertise with.

But all in all, what counts for large corporations is the good performance on the major world markets of the USA, China and Europe.

How things are currently going in the most important region for them in terms of e-cars, in Western Europe - this is shown by a detailed analysis by Schmidt Automotive Research, which is available to manager magazin, which specializes in e-car data.

Photo gallery

The best-selling electric cars in the world

Photo: Ding Ting / imago images / Xinhua

The strong focus of many domestic car manufacturers on the home market of Germany is easy to understand based on the figures available. In the first half of the year, Germany was by far the largest market for electric cars and plug-in hybrids among the 18 countries in Western Europe. From January to June, just under 150,000 battery-only electric cars and 160,000 plug-in hybrids were sold in this country. In France there were only half as many in each of the two categories, in Great Britain around 75,000 pure electric vehicles and almost 60,000 combustion engine cars with charging plugs. In total, just over a million e-cars and plug-in hybrids were sold in Western Europe in the first half of 2021:

Western Europe's e-car sales are approaching those in the world's largest market for e-cars, according to the study: In China, although a total of just under 1.13 million battery-powered cars and plug-in hybrids were sold within six months, the difference was in June but only 8000 vehicles.

The best-selling electric car model in Western Europe in the first half of the year was clearly a vehicle imported from the USA and increasingly from China: Tesla's Model 3 sold 66,000 units across Western Europe, roughly doubling compared to the same period in the previous year.

Volkswagen's e-car hope, the VW ID.3, had sales of 30,000 in all of the 18 Western European countries.

In the first half of 2020, the ID.3 was not yet on the market, so the Wolfsburg-based company has managed a more than decent market launch.

Also exciting: The electric compact SUV ID.4, which is derived from the ID.3 and has been available since the beginning of 2021, had almost 25,000 sales in just one half-year:

The monthly Tesla new registrations fluctuate more than the competition: According to the analysis by Schmidt Automotive Research, well over 20,000 Tesla Model 3s were registered in Western Europe in March and June; in the remaining months the registrations were well below 10,000 units per month.

This could be related to the delivery dates of ships - or simply to the fact that Tesla boss Elon Musk exerts particular pressure on his sellers towards the end of the quarter.

For all other of the ten most-registered e-models, the new registration figures per month are much more constant.

On the basis of the previous figures, Schmidt Automotive Resarch predicts that just over a million fully battery-powered electric cars will be registered in Europe in 2021 as a whole - despite the lack of chips and other effects of Corona.

Tesla's new plant in Grünheide is scheduled to start producing Model Y SUVs at the end of 2021, which should help the US electric car maker with "regional volumes", it says.

VW is also currently ramping up its production capacities for e-cars: in the Saxon town of Zwickau alone, up to 200,000 e-cars are expected to roll off the assembly line every year.

The duel between Tesla and VW for e-car sales in Western Europe should therefore still pick up speed.

wed