More growth expected in 2021
According to experts of the analytical company TrendForce, thanks to subsidies from governments around the world, the market for vehicles for “new energy,” which includes, in particular, battery electric vehicles and cars with hybrid power plants, has grown significantly in 2021. This happened amid a severe downturn in the automotive market as a whole. According to TrendForce, sales of new energy vehicles in 2020 increased by 19.8% compared to 2019, to 2.4 million units.
TrendForce estimates that sales of new energy vehicles increased by 19.8% in 2020
Government subsidies have become the main driver of growth, analysts say. Countries such as China, Germany, the United Kingdom, and France have introduced subsidies to purchase electric vehicles, hoping to stimulate their domestic economies. Governments have been phasing out such subsidies in the past, so the reversal has proven very attractive to consumers, especially in countries where the subsidies are large enough to cover the price differential between electric and gasoline vehicles.
Among regional markets, the greatest momentum is in Europe. Germany, the United Kingdom, and France are projected to collectively sell 630,000 new energy vehicles this year, up 163% from last year. For comparison: in China, growth is estimated at 6%. However, new incentives and emission limits are expected to push new energy car sales in China to surpass the global average next year.