Manufacturers' struggle continues as electric car sales remain weak in Germany
Clean Energy Wire / Handelsblatt
Registrations of new plug-in electric cars in Germany fell by more than a quarter in 2024 compared to the previous year, while the average CO2 emissions of newly registered combustion passenger vehicles rose 4.2 percent, according to the Federal Motor Transport Authority.
Transitioning to electric cars is one of Germany's main strategies to reduce stubborn transport emissions, which have remained largely static since the 1990s. The outgoing government aimed to have 15 million pure electric cars on the road by 2030. But the country is far from reaching that target, currently boasting about 1.4 million registered electric vehicles (EVs) nationwide, according to the KBA.
One reason are the relatively high purchase costs of the cars and the abrupt end of Germany's EV subsidies late last year following a budget crisis, which caused sales to collapse. The issue is becoming a focus for the February snap elections, with Olaf Scholz's SPD calling for more EU support for the electric car market at a Brussel's summit in December, wrote Handelsblatt. The party's election manifesto also outlines incentives for EVs. The CSU, the CDU's Bavarian sister party, said they want to introduce a 3,600-euro EV subsidy if they get into government.
The KBA figures did hold some good news for the country's beleaguered car manufacturers. General car sales were up slightly for Porsche, VW and Opel, although Audi, Mercedes and BMW continued to flounder. The shift to e-mobility, with fierce competition from battery-driven competitors like Tesla and China's BYD, is one reason for the struggles at German carmakers like VW, which recently threatened to cut thousands of jobs in its home country.
In total, around 2.8 million new cars were registered in Germany last year, a one-percent drop on 2023 and a quarter less than 2019. Hybrid car registrations increased 12.7 percent.
