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Are EVs viable?

 A mass market in affordable electric cars will only happen for a while because of the difficulty of

Electric vehicle

producing them commercially viable, one of the largest makers of zero-emission vehicles for British drivers has warned.

Paul Philpott, UK chief executive of Kia, the fast-growing South Korean car company, said it had no immediate plans for a mass-market electric product.

Some fear the prospect of a society of haves and have-nots in the electric car revolution because of the sheer cost of buying or financing a zero-emission vehicle.

While European and Asian manufacturers have been stepping up the production of electric vehicles, they have been concentrating on more expensive models to make healthy profit margins on installing electrified systems. The battery pack is the costliest component of an electric car. The smaller the vehicle, the larger the proportion of the battery in its production cost.

Unveiling Kia’s product launches, Philpott outlined plans to increase the 16,000 electric cars it sold in the UK last year to more than 20,000 in 2023. Its British market share is above 6 per cent. It has overtaken Vauxhall, and only the Volkswagen, Ford, Audi, BMW and Toyota marques sold more.

Of the 267,000 battery electric cars registered in Britain last year, two-thirds were fleet or company cars and a fifth, more than 54,000, were Teslas.

Stripping out Tesla sales, Kia accounted for 7.5 per cent of UK battery electric sales, with its £36,000 e-Niro being the bestselling non-Tesla, zero-emission vehicle.

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Comments

  1. Mike23 January 2023 at 12:45

    Many people want to buy one but there are still measures that need to be taken so it is actually affordable to buy and own such a car.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Graham23 January 2023 at 13:19

      If I was the government I would offer good incentives to people so they buy such cars. By encouraging this market, you are contributing to cleaner air and a cleaner world plus other benefits, so why not do it and do it now?

      Delete

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