There seems to be something of a pattern developing here.
As automakers continue to delay their electric-vehicle plans and report lower-than-expected sales, Canada’s goal of ensuring that at least 20 per cent of new vehicles sold by 2026 are electric seems to be in jeopardy.
Ford Motor Co. last week said it was going to delay EV production at its assembly plant in Oakville, Ont., by two years to 2027 from 2025. The additional time will allow the company to take advantage of an emerging battery technology and let the number of consumers grow.
Canada has still seen a very rapid increase in the number of electric vehicle (EV) sales, but:
the pace of sales has been cut in half, according to J.D. Power, a global data and analytics firm. In the first quarter of 2023, it took an average of 22 days to sell an EV in Canada compared to about 42 days for a gas-powered vehicle. Today, it takes about 55 days to sell an electric vehicle, compared to 51 days for a gasoline car.
The story from Canada mirrors that in the U.S. Plenty of buying from eager and affluent early adopters (with their own garages to minimize charging problems). Other buyers are not so sure, which is hardly surprising.
The Financial Post:
EV owners reported 79 per cent more problems with their powertrains over the past three years than owners of gas-powered vehicles, according to Consumer Reports’ latest annual car reliability survey.
“Most electric cars today are being manufactured by either legacy automakers that are new to EV technology, or by companies like Rivian that are new to making cars,” Jake Fisher, senior director of auto testing at Consumer Reports, said in the report. “It’s not surprising that they’re having growing pains and need some time to work out the bugs.”
It’s not surprising, but it does suggest that EVs are not yet ready for prime time (at least as a mass-market product), let alone to be imposed on drivers.
Another issue is cost. The Financial Post reports that, according to Robert Karwel, a senior manager at J.D. Power’s Power Information Network, an average EV is around C$15,000 more expensive than a traditional car (before subsidies) or about C$20,000 more expensive if a buyer is looking for an EV comparable to his or her current car.
As is the case in many other markets, Canadian buyers are also concerned about the lack of adequate charging infrastructure.
The Financial Post:
A survey of EV drivers conducted by NGO Pollution Probe in 2023 said 56 per cent of EV owners felt that the power supply at public charging stations was not consistent.
According to the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers’ Association, for the Canadian government to meet its target of 442,000 public chargers online by 2035, ten will need to be installed each day between now and then. The total cost? An estimated C$50 billion.
Linked, of course, to concerns about charging is our old friend, range anxiety, supplemented by the fact that Canadians are aware of what cold weather can do to range.
Electric vehicles (and, critically, their batteries) have improved and will continue to improve, as manufacturers try to address consumer concerns. That’s how things are supposed to work. The problem continues to be that governments and regulators are not allowing the EV market to evolve organically. The result has been an increasing (and increasingly expensive) mismatch between EV supply and demand, a problem that climate policy-makers ultimately plan on “solving” with coercion, because that’s what central planners do.
For now, however, Canada’s automakers find themselves in an awkward position. The government has given them EV sales quotas (which will start in 2026, but it counts plug-in hybrids as EVs for these purposes, which is something), but what if drivers are simply not interested in buying EVs in sufficient quantities?
Answer: The taxpayer is supposed to pay up by subsidizing the purchase of cars that taxpayers don’t want to buy.
The bailouts are for later.