California’s push for zero-emission vehicles is going agonizingly slowly – sort of like getting stuck behind those Prius drivers who refuse to step on the gas so they can stay in glide mode.
A new study is raising further doubts about whether the state will make its goal of 1.5 million electric or hydrogen-powered vehicles by 2025.
About 71,000 zero-emission vehicles, which don’t emit carbon and contribute to climate change, are being sold each year in the state, but annual sales need to be about 175,000 to reach the goal, according to the California Center for Jobs and the Economy.
A big problem is that Californians are buying ZEVs in place of hybrids, not instead of gas-guzzling SUVs. In the third quarter of 2016, sales of plug-in and battery electric vehicles rose by nearly 5,600 compared to the third quarter of 2015, the study says. But sales of hybrids, which run on gasoline and electricity, dropped by 7,200.
Over that period, the market share for ZEVs grew from 2.9 percent to 3.9 percent (the goal is 15.5 percent by 2025), but the slice for hybrids shrank from 6.4 percent to 5 percent, according to the center’s analysis of figures from the California New Car Dealers Association.
