Electric vans accounted for 5% of all new vans sold in July, up from 3%
Electric vans accounted for 5% of all new vans sold in July, up from just 3% in the same month last year. Electric vans continue to be the fastest growing market segment, despite the overall number of new van registrations shrinking by 22% compared to July 2021. Diesel still accounted for 93% of new van registrations in July, so it is crucial that the right support is given to the electric van market going forward.
⚡ What Our Data Shows
Ciara Cook, Research and Policy Officer at New AutoMotive, said:
“It is great that more and more businesses and individuals are discovering the benefits of switching to an electric van. However there is still a mountain to climb, with over 15,000 new diesel vans registered in July. Each new ICE van registered is a polluting vehicle that will stay on the roads for years to come.”
“The cost of living crisis and sky-high diesel prices are hitting businesses hard. The savings in running costs electric vans offer could be crucial for many businesses in the difficult months ahead. “
“An ambitious ZEV mandate will be critical in making sure that the supply of electric vans meets demand, as more businesses discover the savings they offer and make the switch.”
The full data release is available here. You can view the data on our interactive dashboard, here.
📈 UK market overview
The continued effect of the cost of living crisis and global supply chain issues saw new van sales drop 22% overall. Electric vans were the only fuel type to significantly grow both in terms of market share and total volume sold compared to July 2021.
🚗 The race for EV market share
Ford secured the biggest share of the electric van market in July, with 1 in 4 new electric van registrations being Ford vehicles. Ford has experienced exponential growth in its share of the electric van market, after selling no electric van models in 2021. Collectively, the top three manufacturers - Ford, Peugeot, and Maxus - represent over half of all electric vans sold in July. Vauxhall’s share of new electric van registrations was just 12% in July, a dramatic drop after it accounted for 47% of all new electric vans registrations in June.
For the full data, and year-on-year comparisons, refer to table 1 in the full release.
📊 The brands who are quickest to electrify
Maxus topped the table of manufacturers who are electrifying the fastest, with 38% of their van sales being electric this month. Vauxhall and Peugeot come in next with 16% and 13% respectively. Despite Ford being the most popular electric van manufacturer in the UK, accounting for 34% of all new electric van registrations, electric vans only accounted for 3% of their total sales.
We exclude brands that are 100% electric from this table since they do not need to electrify their sales. For the full data, refer to table 2 in the full release.
Notes
About Electric Van Count
Electric Van Count is a monthly data series from New AutoMotive, a not-for-profit independent transport research organisation with a mission to accelerate and support the UK’s transition to electric vehicles. You can find out more about New AutoMotive by visiting www.newautomotive.org/mission
Electric Van Count provides an overview of the newly licensed vans. It is released monthly, on the second Monday of each month, providing data on the previous month’s newly licensed vans. In the UK, vehicles must be licensed (also known as registered) to be legally driven on UK roads.
We provide an overview of the state of the market, showing the number of cars registered by each manufacturer, broken down by fuel type. This provides a new way to track the transition to Electric vans in the UK.
Visit our interactive data dashboard here: https://newautomotive.org/evc
For more background information on the statistics we provide, you can read our blog about the race for EV market share: www.newautomotive.org/blog/the-race-for-ev-market-share-is-under-way
Data sources & methodology
The data shows the number of type N1 vehicles (vehicles for the carriage of goods with a maximum mass not exceeding 3.5 tonnes) in the DVLA’s vehicle licensing database as it stands on, or shortly after, the 1st day of the month. The DVLA’s vehicle licensing database is the legal record of all vehicles licensed for use in the UK. We obtain the data from the DVLA’s vehicle enquiry service API, and the DVSA’s MOT history API.
The data covers all vans with a standard form UK vehicle registration mark (VRM, i.e. the vehicle’s number plate), but does not capture any vehicles with personalised VRMs.
Terminology
We use the following terms to refer to vehicle fuel types:
Pure electric: battery electric, or other purely electric-powered vehicles (such as hydrogen). These are vehicles where the drivetrain of the vehicle is only electric, with no facility to drive using a fossil fuelled engine.
Hybrid: vehicles that have the ability to drive under electric power or under fossil fuel power. These include vehicles classified by the DVLA as “hybrid electric”, “electric diesel”, for example.
Q&A
Why are the numbers different from other organisations, such as the SMMT?
Our numbers are typically slightly different from those published by the SMMT. We cannot speculate as to why this is because the SMMT do not publish the methodology for obtaining their vehicle data.
Our data is based on the DVLA’s legal record of vehicles licensed as it stands on the first of the month.
Our methodology does not capture newly registered vehicles with a personalised number plate. These take longer to appear in our database, and are not included in the monthly release. We do not believe that these are a statistically significant part of the market.
Will you make this data open and accessible to more organisations?
Yes, we are happy to supply the data to anyone where doing so will not conflict with our mission. We encourage people to reach out to us on data@newautomotive.org.