As electric vehicles (EVs) become the forefront of humanity’s fight against climate change, even ambitious targets from countries like Canada are proving hard to reach — despite popularity for the zero-emission vehicles continuing to increase.
Canada still won’t meet EV sales targets by the end of this year, despite boasting a 60 percent increase in EV sales throughout last year, according to Global News.
In Q4 2021, plugin cars and SUVs made up over six percent of vehicle registrations for the first time, according to recent quarterly data from Statistics Canada.
Canada to Spend $937,000 for 107 EV Chargers in New Brunswick https://t.co/iwjJTc9Vo1
— TeslaNorth.com (@RealTeslaNorth) March 29, 2022
Throughout all of last year, EV and plugin hybrids made up 5.2 percent of all new registrations totaling around 86,000 vehicles — compared to just 54,000 in 2020 for a total of 3.5 percent of total vehicle registrations.
Five years ago, EVs sold made up under one in 100 new cars sold, jumping up to one in 20 in 2021.
Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault has proposed a mandate that one in five (20%) new passenger vehicles sold should be EVs by 2026, though there’s still a long way to go for the country to achieve that goal, as current growth rates only suggest 15-16% of new registrations by that year.
In a statement, Guilbeault said, “Switching to an electric vehicle is one of the most impactful things Canadians can do to help fight climate change.”
Earlier this month, Canada’s 2022 budget set aside $9 billion for EV rebates, improvements to the battery supply chain and more.
