Electric cars’ cost forecast to plummet

Battery-powered cars will soon be cheaper to buy than conventional gasoline ones, offering immediate savings to drivers, new research shows.

Automakers from Renault SA to Tesla Inc. have long touted the cheaper fuel and running costs of electric cars that helps to displace the higher upfront prices that drivers pay when they buy the zero-emission vehicles.

Now research from Bloomberg New Energy Finance indicates that falling battery costs will mean electric vehicles will also be cheaper to buy in the U.S. and Europe as soon as 2025. Batteries currently account for about half the cost of electric vehicles, and their prices will fall by about 77 percent between 2016 and 2030, the Londonbased researcher said.

“On an upfront basis, these things will start to get cheaper, and people will start to adopt them more as price parity gets closer,” said Colin McKerracher, an analyst at the London-based researcher.