Electric vehicle (EV) sales have surged in Australia this year with more sold in the first half of 2023 than in all of 2022.
Key points:
- Electric cars have made up 8.4 per cent of all new car sales for 2023
- The report states 50 per cent of cars sold need to be electric in 2030, to ensure Australia meets its climate emissions targets
- Public charging locations across the country have increased by around 57 per cent
The Electric Vehicle Council’s annual State of EVs report showed 46,624 electric cars were sold between January and June 2023 compared to 39,353 in the year before.
This makes 8.4 per cent of all new car sales in 2023 electric when including forecasted sales for the rest of the year.
The council’s CEO Behyahd Jafari said while it still puts Australia about two times behind the rest of the world it is an encouraging increase.
“Just a few years ago we were 10 times behind the rest of the world,” he said.
“We are catching up to where everyone else is, we’re steadily making progress.”
The report however noted not having a fuel efficiency standard yet is leading to a lack of supply to meet a clear demand with most of the available car models being sold out.
Australia’s market is also dominated by three models with Tesla Model Y and Model 3 and BYD Atto 3 making up 68.1 per cent, the report found.
Mr Jafari said that until new legislation is implemented, consumers will continue to miss out on vehicles already available overseas.
“It’s about putting the policies settings in place that make sure that when car makers do the great work of building cheaper, better, or newer electric vehicles that Australians get access,” he said.
“We need to do it quickly and we need to make sure that we get it right the first time. We don’t have 30 to 50 odd years to sort it out.”
Not enough EVs to meet climate targets
The report also noted that an increased supply is essential to ensure Australia meets its climate emissions targets with 50 per cent of cars sold in 2030 needing to be electric.
Dr Gail Broadbent who researches EV uptake in Australia said that while she supports the findings, the report fails to convey the urgency of the problem.
“We need to reduce emissions as fast as possible if we are to avert catastrophic climate change and cars are a big part of that,” she told The World Today.
She said modelling showed that if nothing is changed Australia’s EV fleet will only make up about 70 per cent.
“That’s not good enough if we’re going to reach our targets of reducing emissions from road transport,” Dr Broadbent said adding that new cars could last for about 20 years.
The critical factor to reach the targets is for a mandatory emission standard to be implemented as soon as possible, she said.
“If you don’t do that, manufacturers will just continue to sell their limited supply of EV’s in Europe because there are big fines.”
Charging stations doubled in a year
The report showed that there has been an increase of about 57 per cent in the number of public charging locations across the country compared to June 2022 with many locations having multiple chargers.
Mr Jafari said this will help reach the “inevitable point where you have so many options … that you don’t need to have one necessarily at the front of your house.”
But Julie, a resident of Clifton Hill in inner-city Melbourne, said the supply in Victoria is “appalling” and “abysmal” having encountered inoperative stations and in Ballarat and Beechworth as well as only having two chargers in the Yarra council area.
“Every time I have to go out of Melbourne I have to make arrangements and work out my destinations and work out whether the charging stations are working or not,” she said.
“I have friends who want to buy an electric vehicle but will not do it until public charging is much better in Victoria.”
Mr Jafari said the answer is more chargers and better designing sites so there are no outages.
Dr Broadbent said two things need to be considered as the rollout of charger networks continues.
“Making sure there aren’t any queues on long distance travel charge stations and to make sure that people in local areas who want to have an EV but they can’t charge at home can charge near to where they live,” she said.
Victoria scores poorly on EV policy
Despite sales in Victoria being among the highest in the country at 8.5 per cent and the state having the second most charging availability, the report gave it 5/10 on the policy scorecard.
It criticised Victoria for being the only state to introduce an EV road user tax, and for cancelling subsidies.
Mr Jafari called on the government to incentivise people to buy EVs saying the current policy could be a threat to investors and the industry.
“Victoria removed their incentive for buying an electric vehicle and they did that with no warning, no modelling about why it was a reasonable thing to do,” he said.
“All of these things provide a lot of concerns particularly for investors and industry given there is so much uncertainty about what the state will do next.”
Mr Jafari also said that a lag in electric truck policy across all jurisdictions in Australia is hurting opportunities to decarbonise freight.