Of driving an EV in 2019
current plug-in car park of just over
11,000 vehicles is still inconsequential in a national fleet climbing towards 4 million.
If we’re going to reach that stillmodest target of 64,000 EVs by 2021 (set by the National Government in
2016), 2019 will have to be a boom year. But I’m not sure that can happen.
Without massive subsidies on EVs and/or massive taxes on petrol vehicles (they have both in Norway, where EVs are now 30 per cent of new-car sales), high capital cost is an issue. The cheapest new pure-EV on the market (and the biggest seller) is the Hyundai Ioniq, and that starts at $59,990. There are cheaper plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (which still have a combustion engine) like the Toyota Prius Prime at $48,490, but really, the focus for the future is on battery-only vehicles.
Three-quarters of the total New Zealand EV fleet is comprised of used imports – mostly Nissan Leafs. With global sales approaching 100,000 per year, the pre-loved Leaf is still The One for an EV market that’s thirsty for affordable choices.
Getting more mainstream EVs into the new-car market is a must, but the potential choices are few. Ironically, the most significant new model for 2019 will be the latest Nissan Leaf, which will join the brand’s New Zealand new-car lineup this year. Price yet to be announced.
In the bigger picture, getting new EVs into company fleets will help feed the used car market for the future; some businesses have taken the plunge, but the reality is that more individuals currently own New Zealand-new plug-ins than companies (1627 versus 1061).
Advocacy group Drive Electric reckons more incentives are needed to get businesses buying electric. It proposes a tax break called Project Switch, which would see new EVs attract the lower fringe benefit tax rate of the petrol/diesel vehicles they were replacing.
That, combined with high secondhand values (a 2018 Meridian Energy case study shows EVs retain a high residual value of 87 per cent after 14 months, compared with
70-75 per cent for the internal combustion equivalent) would encourage companies to turn over vehicles more frequently – providing more affordable near-new EV choices to private buyers.
But as it stands, 2019 will still be an uphill struggle for real drivers wanting a choice of real-world EVs.
For premium buyers it’s a different story: We’re going to see an influx of amazing EVs, from the much-talked-about Jaguar I-Pace, to the Audi E-Tron and Mercedes-Benz EQC. They’re all SUVs, which is so
2019.
There’s also the long-awaited Tesla Model 3 (gasp – a sedan), and a little further out into 2020 a pureelectric version of BMW’s X3 SUV and the very sporty Porsche Taycan.