The end of EV Sales

"Hello, my name is Jose Pontes and i'm a what you can call a car geek, with a particular interest in the green side of the auto landscape." - It was with these words that i introduced myself on the first post, back in late 2012, explaining why i had created this blog and promising to post reports on the 25(!) markets i was already covering by then. 

Back in those days, the EV Revolution was far less certain than it is now, and PHEV sales were ahead of BEVs, but on the 2013 Preview post, i was mentioning several important additions, like the Renault Zoe, BMW i3, VW e-Up and a certain Tesla Model S...

For me it was interesting to see what i wrote then about these models, saying things like the Zoe had everything to become the Best Selling EV in Europe (so far, it has 3 Best Seller trophies - 2016, '17 and '20), questioning if the BMW i3 high price wouldn't prevent it to become a Best Seller (it's highest standings in Europe were a #2 spot, in 2017, and one #3 in 2018, while the much cheaper Zoe has always been on Europe's podium since 2013...).

Of course, not everything i wrote was prescient, after all, despite saying that the Tesla Model S was going to be the poster car for the EV Revolution, i had doubts that it would top the charts...Which it did, winning the Global Best Seller status in 2015, and earning 3 more podium positions (#3 in 2014, and #2 in 2016 & '17).

Funny enough, in August 2013, i made an update to that post, reporting that Volkswagen was sabotaging their own electric efforts. Remember, this was still pre-dieselgate Volkswagen Group, when it was still on the wrong side of the Revolution... 

   

And volumes were far smaller than now, in the final 2012 Global ranking, i was celebrating that fact that sales had doubled regarding 2011, to...124.000 units. Right now, China or Europe alone beat that number in a single month...That's how far we have become.

EV Sales continued to grow at 50%-plus fates in the following years, but by 2015, plugins were still seen by the mainstream media and most of the Legacy OEMs as "something for the future", that indefinite thing that can be 5 or 25 years time...

Until Dieselgate hit. 

After the presentation of the Tesla Model S, this was the second accelerator moment of the EV Revolution, as it forced one of the biggest Global Legacy OEMs to make a sudden change of direction and bet on whatever EV projects they had at the time, looking back, that near death experience is what allowed them now to be one step ahead of the remaining Legacy competition, after all, of the Top 3 Legacy OEMs (VW, Toyota, Renault-Nissan), the VW Group is the only one on the plugin Top 5 (either PEV or just BEV), as the Japanese maker continues a laggard, and the Alliance is constantly losing charge since Carlos Ghosn left the company.

Another accelerator was the presentation, and subsequent reservation fever, of the Tesla Model 3, back in 2016, for the first time, an EV was playing head to head with the best ICE Best Sellers, not only in specs, but also in price, something that still today most BEVs lose out to their ICE counterparts.

In 2017, the Plugin market hit its first million units in one year, and growth rates continued at 50%-plus rates, so we would have the global market fully electrified by 2030...

But then, subsidy changes in China, by mid-2019, have sent Chinese EV Sales down a cliff, and because at that time, they represented 66%(!) of the global BEV sales, global sales suffered, leading to a full year of constant drops, with the Covid pandemic, that had revealed itself in late 2019, helping along, in the first months of 2020. 

And after a recovering Q3 2020, Global EV Sales went into overdrive last October, with 3-digit growth rates ever since, shortening the expected full electrification horizon to 2027/28...

We have not only surpassed the "Will EVs win?" question, but we are now also surpassing the "How fast?" question (answer: Before 2030), from now on, the electrification process is more or less predictable, being a true arms race between all the OEMs (Legacy, Chinese, Startups, etc) for supremacy/survival, and with electrification now becoming mainstream, last year, 10% of all new passenger cars globally had some form of electrification system, i believe the mission of this blog (document and promote the EV Revolution) is coming to an end.

As such, it is with some sadness that i am announcing that i will stop posting new articles on the EV Sales blog

Besides personal reasons, namely lack of time, EV Sales started out because there was little available data on plugin sales, but now there are several media outlets that play that role, so one can say that the blog has already fulfilled its role, now that others are doing what EV Sales has done over the last 9 years, its time for the EV Sales blog to enjoy its retirement, in a tropical island by the sea, while drinking a Marguerita.

For those that on top of the EV Sales data, enjoy my writing and would like to continue following my analyses, digressions and rants, i will continue writing on CleanTechnica, as i had in the past, and nothing will be changed there.

To all the readers that have formed this EV Sales community over the years, and to those in particular that have helped the blog to florish, be it through suggestions or new data, i want to leave my sincere gratitude here, this wild ride wouldn't have been possible without your help.

Goodbye and good luck y'all!