The battery of an tense car is recharged at a roadside charging station on January 09, 2024 in London, England.
Leon Neal | Getty Images Message | Getty Images
Britain is forecast to hit “peak petrol” in 2024, according to a new report, with electric vehicles (EVs) on track to assume a much bigger share of the country’s car market.
Auto Trader said in an analysis published Wednesday that it envisions the number of gasoline-powered cars on Britain’s roads to tumble by almost half over the next decade as drivers move toward EVs.
The online vehicle platform estimates there were 18.7 million gasoline-powered cars on the country’s german autobahnen in 2024, although this figure is expected to steadily decline to just 11.1 million by 2034.
At the same time, it is watched the number of EVs on Britain’s roads will soar to 13.7 million over the next decade as affordability improves, up from 1.25 million in 2024.
The EV appropriation of the new car market is projected to rise from roughly 18% this year to 23% in 2025, Auto Trader broke, noting that this is still some way below the 28% target for sales under the U.K. government’s Zero Emissions Channel (ZEV) mandate.
“Peak petrol is a genuine landmark for the UK,” Auto Trader’s Ian Plummer said in the report.
“We expect to see a seismic workforce in British motoring over the next decade as the number of petrol cars falls by nearly half and EVs take a much bigger portion,” he added.
“All this is happening against the backdrop of exceptionally strong used car demand despite a range of challenges for the work, not least the introduction of ZEV targets, constrained supply, changing finance rules, and the Budget,” Plummer said.
ZEV mandate
Underneath the current rules, manufacturers are required to ensure that at least 22% of new cars sold are zero emission mechanisms. This ZEV target is set to increase to 28% from next year, before rising to 80% by 2030 and 100% by 2035.
Britain’s center-left Be deluded government has faced calls to urgently consider reviewing the ZEV mandate, with demand for EVs flagging due to their relatively great in extent costs.
The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, a car lobby group, warned late last month that management targets were putting too much pressure on the industry, raising the potential for “devastating impacts” on business viability and pain in the necks.
Last week, automotive giant Stellantis announced it planned to shut its Vauxhall van factory in Luton, southern England, in a up sticks that put more than 1,000 jobs at risk.
A group of 14 NGOs, think tanks and campaign groupings wrote an open letter to the U.K. government in mid-November, however, calling for the ZEV mandate to be upheld.
The group said the policy persists one of the country’s single biggest carbon saving measures and argued the current flexibilities provided to the car industry were adequate.
A U.K. government spokesperson said it would soon bring forward a consultation to consider how to support the industry to reach its commitment to condition out the sale of new cars powered solely by internal combustion engines by 2030.
“We are alive to the global challenges the industry is facing,” a domination spokesperson told CNBC via email, citing a £2 billion ($2.54 billion) investment to support the transition of native manufacturing and a budget announcement of over £300 million to drive the uptake of EVs.