Back in October, a poll revealed that 14 percent of Britons would opt for an electric vehicle (EV) as their next car, up from 10 percent in 2021. Respondents did say, however, that the country’s economic woes might lead them to stick with their existing cars for longer.
Now it seems that the combination of rising EV prices (not least thanks to more expensive lithium) and a weaker economy may be pushing Brits away from EVs and toward (cheaper) internal-combustion-engine (ICE) vehicles.
[British] carmakers plan to slash the number of electric vehicles they manufacture as the spiralling cost of battery-powered models makes them increasingly unaffordable for drivers, an industry body has warned.
The Advanced Propulsion Centre (APC), a green energy group that sits between government and manufacturers, has slashed its estimate for UK EV production in 2025 by a quarter after just three months.
The APC now expects the UK to make 280,000 electric vehicles in 2025, down from a recent estimate of 360,000.
The organisation blamed the downgrade on “an uncertain economy [that] is expected to drive buyers towards cheaper models.” Manufacturers are therefore likely to opt to build budget cars instead.
In 2020, the British government then presided over by Boris Johnson decided to advance the date by which the sale of new ICE vehicles would be banned to 2030, five years ahead of the date selected by the EU (hybrids will be banned by 2035). This ridiculous move — an example of the policy-making disconnected from reality that is so typical of central planning — was part of Johnson’s “green industrial revolution.” Johnson may be a charlatan, but his embrace of green fundamentalism was, for whatever reason, sincere. His promised green industrial revolution, however, was based on little more than wishful thinking, something highlighted by the recent news that Mini will be transferring its EV production from Britain to China.
Though 2030 is some way off, something tells me that the British new-car market is going to be facing some very tough times. And so are Britain’s drivers.