Electric cars: Reports of their death - "highly exaggerated"

It’s that time of the month again. Time to write yet more words on "Electric Cars". Time to get another perspective on this controversial subject.

A survey of new car buyers in California has come up with the statistic that more than a third of new car buyers in California, the nations largest car market, would purchase reasonably priced zero emission electric vehicles if more of them were available in showrooms.

Some 33.4 percent of those polled said they would buy an electric vehicle as their next car purchase if that vehicle were priced close to the same price as a gasoline vehicle.

Part of a study titled "The Current and Future Market for Electric Vehicles," the survey of 934 California new car buyers was conducted in July 2000 by the non-profit Green Car Institute and The Dohring Company automotive market research firm on behalf of the California Electric Transportation Coalition (CalETC). The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent.

The poll results were released during hearings last week before the California Air Resources Board (ARB), which is set to decide whether to maintain or modify California’s long-standing Zero Emission Vehicle production requirements.

The study results sharply contradict auto industry statements to the ARB in recent months that there is little consumer demand for electric vehicles. "This is the study the auto industry didn’t want to see," says David L. Modisette, executive director of CalETC.

"This study used the same research methodologies employed by the auto industry to identify markets for its gasoline vehicles. The results show there is a very strong consumer market for EVs in California, a demand automakers either don’t want to believe or want to go away," Modisette says.

The study shows that the annual consumer market for EVs is between 12 and 18 percent of the new light-duty vehicle market in California. This equates to annual sales of approximately 151,200 to 226,800 electric vehicles, a potential market some seven to 10 times larger than the estimated 22,000 vehicles required to be sold in 2003 under current California regulations.

Other key findings in the research are that car buyers want to be able to buy EVs rather than lease them, and that EVs need to be tailored to consumer tastes in size, features and functionality.

Current EVs are only available for lease. If that limitation were kept, almost 40 percent of those who said they wanted to buy an EV would switch to a gasoline vehicle.

When asked what body style they would prefer for their electric vehicle, those polled responded overwhelmingly (53 percent) in favor of four- or five-passenger sedans that include the amenities found in gasoline vehicles.

The finding isn’t surprising since the most popular gasoline cars in the state are four-door sedans like the Toyota Camry and Honda Civic.

"Consumers have indicated they can deal with a contemporary EV’s range limitations if pricing is reasonable," Modisette says. "Moreover, the public clearly needs more information and education about EVs than has been available to date."

The Green Car Institute is a private, non-profit education and research firm that specializes in the environmental and alternative fuel aspects of the auto industry. It is based in San Luis Obispo, Calif. The Dohring Company is North America’s largest provider of custom market research to the retail automotive industry.

In a related study of how the auto industry arrives at the publicly stated costs and showroom pricing of electric vehicles, Green Car Institute concludes that automakers are not using pricing to create a market for EVs.

"EV costs presented and prices used to market EVs during the past few years by automakers appear to be high, perhaps saying more about auto companies’ feelings about proposed government regulation than about electric vehicles themselves," the study reports. "Setting such high initial prices is not the typical auto industry method of introducing a new vehicle."

The high initial prices of EVs fail to take into account historic precedents of subsidizing the cost of vehicles deemed important to automaker’s overall marketing program or corporate positioning, the study says. Also, as Honda and Toyota have shown with the pricing of their hybrid models, auto companies will endure short-term losses to establish a new and potentially growing market segment.

"Whether it was musclecars during the ’60s, sports cars in the ’80s, or now electric cars in the new century, a car that becomes a key part of the company’s basic image receives corporate support with less expected in terms of program return-on-investment. The high EV prices belie a committed attempt to establish and build a market for EVs," the study concludes.

A copy of the studies may be obtained from the California Electric Transportation Coalition (CalETC), phone 916-552-7077.