Will we all switch to electric vehicles in 2020?

This article was originally published in our "Décryptage Mobilité" newsletter. To receive future articles by email as soon as they are published, Subscribe now.

By Célia Foulon – Consultant

On January 1, 2020, the European standard limiting the average emissions of new cars sold in Europe to 95 g CO2e per km will take effect ^[1]. Such a requirement should promote the rapid development of electric vehicles starting in the first few months of next year. Indeed, under the pressure of deterrent financial penalties, automakers will have to reevaluate the prevailing trend of marketing gasoline- and diesel-powered SUVs and encourage consumers to switch to much lower-emission vehicles, particularly electric ones. In any case, that is the goal of European authorities.

To help the French public make the transition to electric vehicles, the Ministry of Ecological and Solidarity Transition and AVERE have teamed up to launch the website je-roule-en-electrique.fr/^[2]. The purpose of this website is to help French people choose a car based on their usage and needs. It also offers advice on topics such as installing a charging station, financial incentives, and charging times, for example.

One of the legitimate concerns citizens have is the availability of charging stations. Are there enough of them, and are they located everywhere? Or am I at risk of running out of power in the middle of the highway on my next vacation trip?

According to Bruno Lebrun, president of Gireve (Groupement pour l’Itinérance des Recharges Electriques de Véhicules), there are many publicly accessible charging stations (25,000 in France), but they are not yet located where they should be ^[3]. According to him, the charging network currently in place does not align with the areas where electric cars are used. He remains confident, however, noting strong momentum in this sector, which is attracting an increasing number of private investors. He is also counting on local governments, companies looking to invest in an electric fleet, and automakers themselves to install publicly accessible charging stations. While drivers have generally formed a misguided perception of electric vehicles (range, cost, environmental impact, etc.), it must be acknowledged that on the ground, (i) the deployment of charging stations remains highly inconsistent and (ii) is rarely the result of coordinated efforts among stakeholders, who are too focused on a fragmented view of traffic flows. The alignment between drivers’ needs and charging station locations is therefore currently imperfect and, as such, represents a major challenge for the rapid adoption of electric vehicles in France. However, the current state of the network already covers a significant portion of demand—well above the 1% share of EVs in the French vehicle fleet. With the range of vehicles set to expand significantly in 2020 due to new European regulations, we can expect the penetration of electric cars into the vehicle fleet to accelerate quite sharply.

Article written by Célia Foulon – Consultant

Sources: ^[1]Autonews^[2]https://www.je-roule-en-electrique.fr/^[3]The Automotive Industry and Business