[TusharK]

According to the data released by the Society of Manufacturers of Electric Vehicle (SMEV), the Indian EV industry witnessed decent growth in FY2020-21. A total of 2,36,802 electric vehicles were sold during this period. These included electric 2-wheelers (E2W), 3-wheelers (E3W) and 4-wheelers (E4W).



In the E2W segment, the industry registered sales of 1,43,837 units, which include 40,836 high-speed and 1,03,000 low-speed E2W. The sales of E2Ws declined by 6% in FY2021 compared to the previous fiscal. 1,52,000 units were sold in FY2020.

The E3W segment registered sales of 88,378 units compared to 1,40, 683 units in FY2020. The data doesn’t include E3Ws that are not registered with the transport authority.

4,588 electric 4-wheelers were sold in FY2021 compared to 3,000 units in FY2020.

SMEV was expecting good growth before the start of FY2021, but sales remained stagnant due to various reasons. However, The city-speed and high-speed categories in the 2-wheeler segment have witnessed growth. People have also started moving towards advanced batteries like lithium-ion batteries.

[sunilsreenivasg]

2 wheelers seem to take more than half the share and 4 wheeler section will be improved only when the 'range anxiety' is addressed. I'm still not sure whether they are 'really' green vehicles. More the number atleast will reduce the noise pollution.
Rather than this section, they should concentrate bringing EV's in commercial goods' movement. With that, hope the oldest lorries on road with a 'bomb' explosion sound will become obsolete.

[GTO]

Originally Posted by TusharK

4,588 electric 4-wheelers were sold in FY2021 compared to 3,000 units in FY2020.

And Maruti alone sells that many petrol cars on a single working day! Sucks, EVs have a long, uphill climb in India.

Originally Posted by sunilsreenivasg

4 wheeler section will be improved only when the 'range anxiety' is addressed.

IMHO, range anxiety is over-hyped. 300 km range is more than enough for everyone, except those who drive on highways everyday. Range anxiety will anyway be a thing of the past, what with battery tech progressing the way that it is. Carmakers like Audi & Mercedes have already announced 700-km EVs.

[V.Narayan]

Every journey of a thousand miles starts with the first step. Those 4500 odd cars today will, I believe, see geometric growth as we go along the next several years. Re-charging points, better ranges, over coming anxiety of being the early buyer, uncertainty of the unfamiliar will all melt away steadily. We are witnessing and participating in a once in a century change of a fundamental nature.

[Gansan]

Originally Posted by GTO

And Maruti alone sells that many petrol cars on a single working day! Sucks, EVs have a long, uphill climb in India.

That is true, but assuming each petrol car consumes about 500 litres of petrol in a year, 4588 electric cars mean 22,94,000 litres of fuel not consumed! As the saying goes, even the longest journey begins with a small step!

[warrioraks]

Would be interesting to see the split of sales by brands and models. Slow start never the less.

In my opinion, there are two main reasons for these dismal sales:
1. Higher upfront cost of EV vis-a-via ICE models
2. Hassles with getting charging infra at home/office

The first problem I feel will solve itself with economies of scale, evolution of technology, etc. But the second problem is the tougher one to overcome. Not everyone has a fixed parking and even those who have it, will find it difficult to setup charging.

Range anxiety as mentioned by GTO is overhyped. In a country where people are ready to compromise safety for higher mileage, range is something which people will not even think about once manufacturers are able to show real ₹ savings of driving an EV. Having first hand experience of knowing people who have gone for CNG despite the bad performance, shortened car life cycle and long queues at the filling pump - people will gobble up EVs once it starts making economic sense.

[amit_purohit20]

Originally Posted by GTO

IMHO, range anxiety is over-hyped. 300 km range is more than enough for everyone, except those who drive on highways everyday. Range anxiety will anyway be a thing of the past, what with battery tech progressing the way that it is. Carmakers like Audi & Mercedes have already announced 700-km EVs.

I feel 300 km range is enough for an electric car if you use it to travel within a radius of 150 km, practically that means 110-120 kms radius. I wouldn't risk going beyond that due to the fear of getting standed without a charge.

Most people can't afford two cars, one for < 120 kms travel (within city and office travel) and the other for beyond that (leisure /business trips out of the city).

Add to it the poor infrastructure of charging and the long time required to charge it , this makes electric cars more suitable for only city travel and hardly beyond that.
It also means doing away with your monthly leisure trips out of city and the yearly long highway drive trip. Hiring another self drive car for above mentioned trips is not everyones preferred choice and many people are yet to come to get used to the thought of hiring self drive cars.

Present Covid scenario makes it more difficult to choose a hired vehicle for the trips.

A few minutes of charging time or a really long range enough to justify a charging time of approximately 4 hours is required.

The additional worry which makes people stay away from electric cars is the long term reliability of the battery and its tech. and its ability to maintain the said range after a couple of years.

The last point which comes to my mind is the cost of replacing the entire battery after 6-7 years at a cost of 70 percent of the entire vehicle cost.

Two ways by which the electric vehicle can come in reality faster is 1) The battery tech should improve further or 2) the fossil fuel prices explode to such an extent that its nearly impossible to afford a fossil fuel car.
I think both of above mentioned points are going to happen!

[SKC-auto]

Originally Posted by amit_purohit20

I feel 300 km range is enough for an electric car if you use it to travel within a radius of 150 km, practically that means 110-120 kms radius. I wouldn't risk going beyond that due to the fear of getting standed without a charge.

What GTO meant here is, a car with 300km range is enough with proper charging infrastructure. Without proper infrastructure everyone wants 1000km range cars.

If you have proper infra in place, you can easily do 800-1000km trips in a day just like a normal ICE car even on an EV with 300km range. Most of your stated worries are really not major issues.

The additional worry which makes people stay away from electric cars is the long term reliability of the battery and its tech. and its ability to maintain the said range after a couple of years.

Reliability concerns exist because it's a new tech used at a mass scale. If you hear from the OEMs the latest batteries have a potential to out last even the car chassis.

The last point which comes to my mind is the cost of replacing the entire battery after 6-7 years at a cost of 70 percent of the entire vehicle cost.

This is a myth, you do not need to replace the battery in 6-7 years, the battery warranty on Kona, MG ZS EV and Nexon is for 8 years, they last for atleast another 8 years, after which the range decreases to may be 150 kms. The battery costs to the manufacturer is < 25% today( for MG ZS EV 150$ * 45kwh * 75₹ = ₹5lakh), certainly not 70% to replace after 10 years.

Two ways by which the electric vehicle can come in reality faster is 1) The battery tech should improve further or 2) the fossil fuel prices explode to such an extent that its nearly impossible to afford a fossil fuel car.
I think both of above mentioned points are going to happen!

Battery tech is improving very fast, the cost of Li battery was 1000$ a decade ago, now we are at almost 100$/kWh, we will be at 50$/ kWh by 2025, we are seeing billions of $ invested in research to bring cheaper, safer & lighter batteries.

[HammerHead]

Originally Posted by GTO

IMHO, range anxiety is over-hyped. 300 km range is more than enough for everyone, except those who drive on highways everyday. Range anxiety will anyway be a thing of the past, what with battery tech progressing the way that it is. Carmakers like Audi & Mercedes have already announced 700-km EVs.

Not really. Lets talk about a practical example. I drive 80% within the city and 20% on the highways. EV makes sense and if I pickup a 300 KM range EV how am I going to manage those three 500KM trips I do in a year? Halt for ~7-8Hrs just after covering 250KM, charge the batteries and hit the road again? Does that make sense? What other options do I have?

In my highly personal opinion, Hybrids were the real stopgap between fossil fuel cars and EV's.
The current infra for EV's seems like chicken & egg situation.

[prasi55]

Originally Posted by HammerHead

Halt for ~7-8Hrs just after covering 250KM, charge the batteries and hit the road again? Does that make sense? What other options do I have?

In my highly personal opinion, Hybrids were the real stopgap between fossil fuel cars and EV's.

The fast chargers provide 80-100% charge in an hour, so you'd only need to halt for about an hour on those 500 km trips, so it's not all that impractical.
Having said that, I also believe that hybrids are the real stop gap/solution, given that you don't need to worry about being stranded or even about battery degradation/replacement. Analysis has shown that PHEVs like the Toyota RAV4 Prime can be greener than only battery EVs as well.

PHEVs (plug-in hybrid EVs) that give even 50-100 km in battery mode are a win-win.

[amods]

Originally Posted by GTO

IMHO, range anxiety is over-hyped. 300 km range is more than enough for everyone, except those who drive on highways everyday. Range anxiety will anyway be a thing of the past, what with battery tech progressing the way that it is. Carmakers like Audi & Mercedes have already announced 700-km EVs.

I will speak for myself here. For now, even if it's psychological, it is real for me.
Even though my car doesn't have a run more than 5k in a year(Non Covid days) I would not buy(If I were in market today) an electric just for the low range they offer - 90% the reason and 10% is high cost.

I love my highway trips and would not want to be stuck due to charge(or lack of it).

Also, I don't want to plan charging for every single trip of mine for now and keep charging the vehicle after reaching home, even if it needs to be done once a week.

That trouble free feeling of pulling in to a fuel station when needs arises and be done in 5 minutes is what I would prefer.

My 2 cents about my mindset.

[one-77]

I think the primary problem is where one would charge their EV, rather than range. The second would be the high upfront cost. The vast majority of Indian buyers don’t do long highway drives, so range would we lesser of a concern.

If I were to buy an EV today in Bombay, there’s no way I could charge it except go to the nearest EV station. And that’s just too inconvenient.
My apartment does have fixed parking slots, but most of these are within the compound and not covered. No way I (or anyone) could set up an EV charger. Most apartments in South Bombay don’t even have adequate parking for the residents. The same goes with most offices.

On the other hand if I were to move back home, I would actively consider buying a small EV, as I could set up a charger at home, and so could most people as they still have independent homes.

[pkk077]

I think the major impediment is that EV tech is still in nascent stages. An NCR based person buying a diesel even today can hope to get better resale after 10 year than they would get for a similarly priced EV. So far, all the perceived monetary benefits and savings of EVs are on paper only and you get added restrictions (range, battery life etc). Once EVs make a monetary sense, people will find ways to overcome other issues.

[veedub89]

And the government wanted us to be full EV by 2030?

hahaha. What a joke.

EVs, as of now, have extremely low utility in our market.
Pathetic infrastructure, practically zero incentives on EV ownership and constant policy flip-flop have combined to make sure that the only EVs we have are the jugaad three wheelers in urban areas.

By any estimate we are at least 10 years away from the charging infrastructure present in the US and some European countries. In those 10 years the battery tech would have changed so much that your current EV will more or less be redundant. Not to account for the fact that your battery may itself require changing.

People are getting excited that Tesla is coming to India. Why? New toy for the rich to show off?
Tesla sells because of its supercharger network. We have zero such superchargers.

Most of us get so riled up when an auto maker removes the spare tyre from the standard kit. Now imagine owning a car which, if you don't plan a road trip properly, might have to serve as a metal box for you to sleep in.

[redeff]

The biggest issue in the sale of EVs in India, according to me, is the lack of choice. The first decent option , aka. the Nexon, is above 15 Lakh on road. The MG Hector and the Kona are both 10 lakh more. The jump from there to the other EVs then is stratospheric.


If decent ranged cars are introduced at the sub- 10 lakh price bracket, especially by brands like Maruti and Hyundai, we can see the numbers go up significantly as city drivers. For now though, the Evs are mere halo models, if at all.