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'Passionate' electric car owners to drive growth, Shell says

27th November 2018

By: Bloomberg

  

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Demand for electric cars will continue to surge irrespective of oil prices as consumers buy into a technology aimed at making driving fun while being environmentally friendly, according to Royal Dutch Shell.

“It’s a technology many of our customers like,” Istvan Kapitany, head of Shell’s global retail business, said in an interview in St. Petersburg, Russia. “They get a joy out of it, they feel passionate about it, they think it’s a great driving experience.”

Kapitany isn’t the first oil industry executive to highlight how the cool factor could play a big role in the spread of electric vehicles. BP’s chief economist Spencer Dale said in 2016 that the technology could wipe out most of the projected growth in oil demand from cars in the next two decades if consumers embraced it enthusiastically – on a par with Apple’s iPhone.

Social desirability is important enough for consumers to ignore that battery-powered technology is currently more expensive than internal combustion engines, Kapitany said.

“Customers don’t always make rational decisions – if it weren’t like that, it would be very difficult to sell sports cars,” he said.

It may take until the middle of the next decade for the cost of electric vehicles, or EVs, and internal combustion engine technology to reach parity, according to Bloomberg NEF. Though EV sales have surged, they still make up only about 3% of all new cars sold globally but will rise to 55% by 2040.

Kapitany estimates 1.2-million to 1.5-million electric cars will be added this year to the 3.5-million on the road as of end-2017. Tax incentives offered to EV buyers in some countries, as well as regulatory moves to lower carbon emissions, add to their attraction, he said.

Brent crude’s recent surge to over $80 a barrel fueled expectations of an increase in demand for electric and hybrid cars to market. Prices have since dropped to about $60, bringing down gasoline with it and making cars that run on the fuel more economical.

Shell, Europe’s largest oil company by market value, is positioning itself to gain from the demand for EVs. Last year it bought Europe’s largest charging provider NewMotion andreed with IONITY – a Munich-based venture between BMW Group, Daimler, Ford Motor and Volkswagen – to expand the business.

Edited by Bloomberg

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