Featured Canadians' confidence in electric vehicles dropping, says report

are those surveys accurate enough to make a two point drop relevant?

 

No problem, ‘muricans will show you guys. Er, wait it’ll just have to be us regular Americans.

On a more serious note, you guys have a legitimate colder environment and lower population density excuse to be behind, but BEVs are still coming to the land of the north.

 

THIS is how the USA actually thought:

 

Is there data on Canadians who voted with their wallets?

I’ve grown skeptical of JD Powers.

Bob Wilson

 

2020 Q3 Mobility Confidence Index Study | J.D. Power

n > 8500 on the EV question, nearly 9000 on the self driving question. So two points ought to be meaningful.

 

Outside CARB many US states are sliding on annual BEV sales though used PHEVs are in some cases more than making up the difference.

Wisconsin’s Titled and plated 3500 BEV high water mark achieved years ago Has changed very little showing BEVs basically don’t sell here, perhaps people trade up to another and the old one is exported to a more fruitful sales zone?

Very sad no one wants to show publicly the reality of how many BEVs actually have plates in each state instead of the increasingly meaningless how many used/new plug ins sold this year metric.

 

ford selling pickups like they're going out of style. not ev pickups

 

And 2 points is significant and worthy of a headline. Sounds like well within the margin of error.

 

There seems to be a lack of stats on Tesla Sales in Canada?

 

Tesla Semi secures one of its biggest orders to date from US-Canada logistics company
Tesla Semi secures one of its biggest orders to date from US-Canada logistics company

 

That’s cool! Also, cool that they are not just limiting purchase to one manufacturer.

“However, PGE’s Vice President of Operations Aman Johal also stated that the company is looking forward to working with other OEMs producing Class 8 trucks in the future as well.”

 

TESLA refuse to allow their sales to be included in statistics released in Australia - so effectively sales are NIL. As reported.

Dumb idea.

But then - maybe I see one a month on the roads.

 

it seems the chart (more than anything else) shows the Tacoma Pickup wasn't as popular as the Camry - but the Dodge, Ford, & Chevy Pickups were more popular than the Camry. What the chart doesn't show is the drop in popularity of the sedan in general, based on sales.
Also - GM trucks for last year - not listed in the above mix -would add another 275K-280K to the Chevy number. Bottom line - (not even counting Nissan Titan) over 2 million pickups. Any wonder why so many manufacturers are trying to be 1st to get their EV pickup to market?
But cold plays a part in both ICE & EV propulsion. There are many an ICE car that won't even start when temps dip below -10ºf w/out the use of a block heater & healthy 12V starter battery. That's why we grill block too ... helps w/ efficiency.
So it is with EV's as well. There are methods to deal with uber cold - both modes of transportation.
With virus related jobs lost - it's surprising the car markets aren't worse than they are. Our 5 acres of employees just dropped from nearly 100 ... to only 2 remaining as of today ... myself & one other being the only survivors. For those so situated - it undoubtedly sucks to have house & / or car payments. Merry Christmas.
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Tesla has always reported sales quarterly. Any monthly figures are educated guesses, or another source like newly registered cars. So getting numbers should be possible if someone was willing to do the work, and it seems some has: Tesla approaching 10,000 sales in Australia - motoring.com.au and Tesla claims 80% of Australian market as electric vehicles near 18,000 mark

With GM now reporting quarterly, other places that report sales figures have stopped with the guessing for Tesla monthly figures.

The US doesn't have anything like VFACTS. The manufacturers just put the sales figures out at whatever interval they want as a press release. Considering the size of Australia's current EV market, I can see why Tesla wouldn't want to expend an employee's time on making the report to the FCAI.

 

The problem is - just last week we heard some "official" figures which were taken from interrogating registrations - which are individual by states and territories, and not easy to get, but obviously not impossible. Or so it seemed - UNTIL - the TESLA club in 2 states accused those figures of being wildly understated.

So - until TESLA joins every other manufacturer here and being upfront, their figures will be semi-fiction.

EVs are only a tiny figure compared with ICE and hybrid vehicles at this stage, so it really doesn't matter.

 

There's youtube video (several now) of a standard range (220 miles) - rear wheel drive Model 3 driving around Canada in -30ºC / -40ºC weather. He points out how range is reduced up to 50%. That'd mean 110 miles range.

Reduced range (according to some) driver mind sets:

- "100 miles ... that's not enough range for 20%-30% of the year"
versus
- "most don't go out when it's that cold anyway - so 100 mile range is ok"

It may be a combination of several factors why Canadian EV sales are slumping. Aren't jobs/lockdown affecting Canada this past year? Possibly less income? We've personally noticed driving in cold Montana winters ... yea we limit driving - so less range wouldn't be insurmountable ... especially knowing where to charge if you had to stay out in the cold for longer drives .... but lower range would be a put off for some. EV's with 300+ miles reduced ranges of 30%-50% would be more do-able for most ... but longer range EV's cost more. Higher cost cars affect larger amounts of sales.
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"A full 19 per cent of Canadians surveyed said they knew nothing about electric cars, and have expressed concern with the environmental toll of old batteries ending up in landfills and further polluting the earth."

Think we found the Canadians not buying hybrids too.

"Even previous owners of electric vehicles said they wouldn’t buy one again because of high maintenance costs, steeper purchase prices, limited battery ranges, and poor performance in cold weather."

Seems some early BEVs weren't fully vetted for extreme climates. Resistant heaters will really eat into range as the temp drops, but that's better than permanent battery damage when it gets too hot out.

As you said, the EV market is tiny there.

The Model 3 estimate would have to be over reporting for an actual number to even be close to the others.

I couldn't find info on what was required of manufacturers reporting into the VFACTS. I see reports are available per state. Only California publishes such info, and it is done by the dealer association there. I was wondering if GM would bother with it if they were new, and not already established in Australia.

Tesla's quarterly numbers for Australia might be in the quarterly financial reports.