EV sales have not fallen, cooled, slowed or slumped. Stop lying in headlines.

EV sales continue to rise, but the last year of headlines falsely stating otherwise would leave you thinking they haven’t. After about full year of these lies, it would be nice for journalists to stop pushing this false narrative that they could find the truth behind by simply looking up a single number for once.

Here’s what’s actually happening: Over the course of the last year or so, sales of battery electric vehicles, while continuing to grow, have posted lower year-over-year percentage growth rates than they had in previous years.

This alone is not particularly remarkable – it is inevitable that any growing product or category will show slower percentage growth rates as sales rise, particularly one that has been growing at such a fast rate for so long.

In some recent years, we’ve even seen year-over-year doublings in EV market share (though one of those was 2020->2021, which was anomalous). To expect improvement at that level perpetually would be close to impossible – after 3 years of doubling market share from 2023’s 18% number, EVs would account for more than 100% of the global automotive market, which cannot happen.

Instead of the perpetual 50% CAGR that had been optimistically expected, we are seeing growth rates this year of ~10% in advanced economies, and higher in economies with lower EV penetration (+40% in “rest of world” beyond US/EU/China). Notably, this ~10% growth rate is higher than the above Norway example, which nobody would consider a “slump” at 94% market share.

It’s also clear that EV sales growth rates are being held back in the short term by Tesla, which has heretofore been the global leader in EV sales. Tesla actually has seen a year-over-year reduction in sales in recent quarters – likely at least partially due to chaotic leadership at the wayward EV leader – as buyers have been drawn to other brands, while most of which have seen significant increases in EV sales.

News @lemmy.world

MicroWave @lemmy.world

10mo ago

EV sales have not fallen, cooled, slowed or slumped. Stop lying in headlines.

electrek.co /2024/09/10/ev-sales-have-not-fallen-cooled-slowed-or-slumped-stop-lying-in-headlines/

86 comments

Got a PHEV for our family recently, wanted to go full EV but our region just doesn't have enough charging stations available yet.
While going over the paperwork for the financing, the paperwork guy was talking about how the car company keeps pushing them to order EVs for their lot but they keep refusing. They don't want to sell EVs because they think people don't want them, because they think it just "won't ever work" - so now I think that there may be other car dealers like that who are holding back what options consumers may have in there area. I had to drive 100 miles to buy the PHEV I wanted, none nearby.
- Until they make electric vehicles that need as much maintenance and repairs as ICEs car dealers will of course oppose them.
  
  We got a Toyota bz4x (we got a very good deal on it, and I wouldn't recommend it unless you also get a good deal), and the official maintenance schedule is ridiculous and clearly unnecessary. Every 5k miles, you're intended to take it to the dealer to make sure the coolant is topped off, the wheel nuts are on tight, and the floor mats are in place. That's about it. And it'll pop up a "Maintenance Required" warning on the dash to tell you, and it stays there until you get it done.
  
  Not much difference. You still need to rotate the tires and such. The engine is complex but generally doesn't need much maintenance other than oil changes.
  
  Umm actually, EVs currently have higher total service costs
- That's a good insight, car dealers are a huge part of the market, and they exert a lot of pressure against change. They also fund and support a lot of local Republican candidates, historically, a fact not entirely unrelated.
- Car dealers are very much part of the problem. They're very reluctant to let go of their comfy little racket.
  
  Someone should tell them they may get more business from EVs. Sure, EVs need less maintenance: which affects all the commodity items you could go anywhere for. However Tesla is vertically integrated and I believe all manufacturers are more so than with ICE. Without commodity parts, there is a higher percentage of service calls that can only be done at a dealer.
- Got a PHEV for our family recently, wanted to go full EV but our region just doesn’t have enough charging stations available yet.
  I've been a very happy Chevy Volt customer for this reason. 90% of the time, I get around on my 50 mile charge just fine. But if I'm going on a road trip, I get another 400 miles out of my 7 gallon tank.
  Shame Chevy gave up on the Volt as soon as the hybrid credits ran out. It seems like the industry is just chasing government subsidies, whether they're turning out Bush Era Hummers or Obama Era Priuses.
  
  The Prius came out in 98/99 before Bush was even president (not to mention Obama).
- Not just dealers. My brother is an engineer at a legacy car manufacturer and keeps giving me reasons why EVs will never work. If engineering doesn’t want to build EVs because it’ll never work, how will there be a compelling product to sell?
  I just did a 1,200 mile road trip in my EV that did seem to affect his attitude though
  
  I work with a ton of engineers and their profession/title doesn't mean they're immune from being behind the times, misinformed, or just plain wrong about stuff they work with.
  
  Engineers are other car manufactures have made them work. His management is already taking notice and is trying to figure out how to respond.
- part of me wonders if they think they can just 'wait this whole Eeee-veee thing out'.
  fucking idiots
Thank you this royally pisses me off whenever I hear it from Ford or Chevy. They could be selling like hotcakes but they much rather go back to their cash cows and the oil industry to milk.
- They could be selling like hotcakes but they much rather go back to their cash cows and the oil industry to milk.
  Have we seen that Ford and Chevy are able to manufacture EVs at a profit? Chevy Bolt reportdely lost $9k per vehicle sold. Ford has reported they've lost as much as $40k per vehicle sold on Mach e.
  It is absolutely possible to create profitable EVs, but so far Ford and Chevy don't seem to be able to.
  
  It’s not that they can’t manufacture for a price that can be profitable, it’s that they haven’t yet sold enough to make back their development costs. Most of that “loss” is simply not scaling enough. Every car model has a huge upfront cost of development and manufacturing costs that need to be made back. However if you allocate that over a small number of vehicles, of course it will never happen. They b need to get serious about selling them
- When was the last time Ford or Chevy had a car that sold like hotcakes, EV or otherwise? Ford hasn't even made a car in several years and focuses solely on SUVs/CUVs and trucks. Their only bread and butter is their passenger trucks, which aren't even being threatened by EVs.
  
  BYD Shark plug in hybrid has entered the chat.
  
  Well until a few years ago when they decided to stop making cars (except the Mustang), they made the best selling vehicle in the world, the F150 and the best selling car, the Ford Focus. That's why I didn't understand why they made that decision. The same decision pretty much killed Isuzu in the US. Must not have made them much money, I guess.
To expect improvement at that level perpetually would be close to impossible
Capitalists and cancer cells disagree
Hard to get excited about Electric Vehicles when the major players are Elon fucking Musk and China, contributing to humanity crushing fascism either way, blech. I care where my support and my money goes.
- How about Hyundai? They have some excellent EVs for a good price.
- The Koreans and the French of all people have some good options it seems.
- People suggested some other foreign manufacturers that were not China, but if you wanted something made in the US, Rivian is an option, albeit an expensive one.
  
  Tesla is the most American made car. My Model S was built in Fremont CA.
In a system which demands eternal growth slowing growth is called a slump.
I paid a visit to Ford's Henry Ford Museum and did the factory tour. It's an absolutely great museum full of industrial progress throughout the ages, however it does mostly center on the American side of things. Highly recommend a visit, it will take you all day to see everything. Anyway, the factory tour is definitely Ford Propaganda, especially for the F150, and they do discuss the EV market which is massively smaller than the ICE truck market, however every single EV truck is sold before it leaves the factory. There's no inventory sitting around. I imagine that's partly due to production line issues like materials availability, but nonetheless the demand is there for EV, even trucks.
Imagine what they'd be without Biden's 100% tariff on affordable Chinese EVs.
- Probably a decline as all other manufacturers selling in the US go out of business and hundreds of thousands of union jobs are lost, only for China to then jack up their prices.
  
  Id like to remind everyone the feds bailed out fucking cruise ships
  You know those things that are sooooo valuable to the economy. Pretty sure if they had a hard time adjusting the feds would give them a fat fucking vault of cash.
Are you just talking about the US? In the EU, the sale of fully electric cars has actually gone down (as a % of market share), mostly to the gain of hybrids. See for example https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2024/0829/1467243-european-car-sales/
- Petrol and diesel cars have dropped more. The main problem is Germany where they’ve dropped the subsidies from one day to the next late last year and have since been discussing bringing them back. Like that is going to stimulate sales…
I just assumed people are buying less Teslas, as everyone seems to have finally noticed what a POS they are.
- And yet they’re still in many ways the best EVs available.
  I think people are buying fewer Teslas because
  the CEO can’t stop being an ass
  too many buy for styling, but they focus more on functional changes. Each model has continuous improvement yet doesn’t change appearance
  
  Yeah, sure, that's why. https://www.tesladeaths.com/
  Edit: Don't stop downvoting, but for comparison please go here and pull down "Midsize" & "Luxury Cars": https://www.iihs.org/ratings/driver-death-rates-by-make-and-model
  There is one model in that size worse than the Tesla 3, so it's got that going for it! Wonder why the 2WD version is so much safer.
But GM gave us 100,000!
They definitely are way down, in Germany.
Bought a Tesla last week and I love it. Quality is flawless (unlike what the media likes to write about) and it's saving me a ton of cash by not buying fuel. Charging at home is so damned simple and convenient. I can't imagine every driving an ICE vehicle.
One of the key reasons traditional manufacturers were reluctant to build EVs is because of the batteries needed and their lack of ability to make these themselves. A battery on a brand new EV can be half or more of the total cost to build the car, who wants to pay somebody else, who is going to expect to make a profit on the batteries they sell, half the cost of the build to a competitor or third party for any true mass market car? You cannot start to compete on price or volume till you make your own batteries and cut out that profit of the third party.
When it became clear that the Traditional Manufacturers could no longer avoid ramping up EV production as Tesla and latter China/Korea were stealing their future market they have shit the bed, begging for subsidies to build their own battery factories and recruiting staff with experience. Its going to take a few years before these factories come on line, but till then you will see them pushing things like PHEVs and halo EVs like the F150 that they do not plan in selling in large volumes in favor of ICE that they make the engine.
There is also an element of the speed of development of EVs, they were clearly caught out how fast the market moved with efficiency and thus range. As an example, the early VW group EVs were awful, at least a generation behind the best from Korea or Tesla. The latest ID7 and A6 etrons show that VW have acknowledged their mistake, the saloons made on that platform (the SUVs on the same platform just cannot compete due to worse drag and weight) seem to be aiming around 4 miles per kwh, which is extremely impressive for such large saloons.
Improving efficiency is the key to reducing battery sizes, which reduces weight, which further improves efficiency, but most importantly reduces the cost of EVs. We need to move away from 100kwh+ batteries, they are a crutch for inefficient, bricks of SUVs that are far too large and heavy. Manufacturers just up the battery size to counter their poor design decisions, which leads to disappointment when you realize you struggling to get 2 miles per kwh from your 2.5 ton EV9 and its only doing low 200s out of a 100kwh battery.

86 comments