EVs have been hitting the news for a variety of reasons. Locally they have lost the Clean Car discount rebate from the start of the year and will have to start paying their way towards maintaining the roads by way of RUCs from April 1st, PHEVs will also pay at a reduced rate. The RUC change will bring in between $80 and $100 million in the 2024/25 year!

The combination of these two factors will somewhat crimp the cost savings of EVs, which still have a considerably higher purchase price.

Allied to this there has been strong push back internationally by consumers, which has resulted in a sagging of EV demand, some significant manufacturer overstocking and a number of key manufacturers scaling back EV production volumes and delaying some new EV model launches.

Some of the factors that are causing concern are the traditional ones around range anxiety and ability to charge away from home, but there are some new factors arising around repair and insurance costs, increasing running costs as electricity increases and the public charging providers find they need to increase charges to recover capital outlay.

NZ is fairly lucky as the majority of owners can charge at home in their garage, but overseas many do not have off-street parking.

The relative unreliability of the public chargers is an issue.

Whilst EVs have lower servicing costs (less parts), insurance repair costs can be significantly higher, especially if there is any potential that the battery may have internal damage which pretty much makes it a write off. Tyre wear is also higher due to the much higher weight of an EV due to the battery which adds several hundred kgs. Recent snow and ice in the Northern hemisphere has also highlighted the degraded range performance in cold conditions.

Time will tell – there seem to be other interesting technologies starting to appear (Toyota’s hydrogen engine for one) – guess it is watch this space!