German CAM sees ‘giant leap in EV adoption in 2025 despite resilience’

The German-based Centre for Automotive Research (CAM) has released an analysis of EV registrations in Europe’s key markets for the first half of the year. CAM sees a significant opposing trend where the UK is nearing taking the lead from Germany as Europe’s biggest EV market.

CAM spots an overall resilience for electric cars, especially in countries like Germany. Still, despite the mediatized worrying signals, it also forecasts a giant leap in EV adoption for 2025.

The founder and director of CAM, Prof. Dr. Stefan Bratzel, posted the analysis on his LinkedIn page. Between January and August of this year, 1,213,262 battery-electric vehicles (BEVs) were newly registered in Europe (including the EFTA countries and the UK).

This marks a slight decline of 5.5% compared to the same period in 2023 when 1,283,776 EVs were registered. That’s a rather modest drop, despite recent press ringing alarm bells over failing EV adoption.

CAM’s outlook remains optimistic, with notable growth in several key markets balancing the decrease in bothers. However, Bratzel’s analysis shows significant disparities between countries.

Closing the gap with Germany

Germany, Europe’s largest automotive market, has seen a significant 32% drop in BEV registrations, with only 241,911 units sold this year compared to 355,575 in the same period last year.

The decline is largely attributed to the phasing out of the environmental bonus for commercial buyers and the impending end of consumer subsidies in 2024. The rush to capitalize on these incentives in 2023 led to inflated sales, followed by a sharp drop-off this year.

In contrast, the United Kingdom has emerged as a strong contender, posting a 10.5% increase in EV registrations, bringing the total to 213,544. With this upward trajectory, the UK is rapidly closing the gap with Germany and could soon become Europe’s largest EV market if Germany’s slowdown continues.

France is also showing steady growth, with an 8.1% increase in BEV registrations, now totaling 188,575 vehicles.

Rising stars

While the major markets of Germany, the UK, and France draw most of the attention, several other European countries are showing impressive growth. As we know, in Belgium, an extraordinary 41.3% increase in EV registrations was registered due to the company car policy, rising to 84,137 units and overtaking Sweden in fourth place. Sweden, impacted by a change in subsidy policies, saw a 21% decline in sales, dropping to 54,304 BEVs this year.

Denmark posted the highest growth among the top 10 countries, with a 50.8% increase in EV sales, registering 51,945 new electric cars compared to 34,440 last year. Despite this impressive growth, Denmark remains eighth, just behind Sweden.

Other countries like Italy and Spain have shown mixed results, with Italy seeing a 12.3% decline to 35,785 BEVs and Spain experiencing a modest 2.5% increase to 31,665 units. Norway, which is still the leading country in EV penetration, saw a decline of 3.2%.

A major leap in 2025

Despite these mixed results, Bratzel remains optimistic about the future of the EV market. He predicts an encouraging leap in EV sales by 2025 as automakers will likely ramp up their efforts to meet CO2 fleet targets.

He also thinks governments across Europe are expected to continue introducing policies to support the transition to electric mobility, though not in Flanders, where the newly installed government has decided to axe incentives for private purchases of BEVs and apply a road tax to newly purchased BEVs.