Nathaniel Bullard’s latest Sparklines article for Bloomberg Green makes some interesting arguments around EV adoption.
First, he shows that cars in general have been getting a lot more expensive. Looking at new vehicle market share in the US according to price (above), you can see how quickly cars over $40k have become about half of the market. Only some of this is inflation.
Nathaniel then goes on to show just how many people lease a luxury vehicle (apparently this is called lease penetration). For Infiniti it’s 55.6%, for BMW it’s 49%, and for Mercedes it’s about 40%.
When you consider that “upfront cost parity” between EV and internal combustion vehicles is supposed to arrive sometime in 2024, there is an argument to be made that people are destined to start buying a lot more EVs in the near future.
They’re already buying expensive cars and EVs will soon be cost neutral in that regard. At the same time, a lot of people lease their cars and will be in a position to easily switch when it makes sense to do that.
I think the greater barrier to adoption at this point will be the charging network and “range anxiety.” Too many plug types and not enough charging stations, except maybe if you have a Tesla. But at some point that too will change, I’m sure.
BRANDON DONNELLY 
As we in Texas learned last week with sustained single digit temperatures resulting in no power, those with EV’s were grounded and could not get to a hospital or store for food or water (ultimately the stores ran out of both because roads were impassable). Before there is wide acceptance of EV’s, we must be certain that we have developed the correct building codes and infrastructure to deal with such climate situations. We can build to overcome the cold but hurricanes pose the same problem with less opportunity for man to create a solution.
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