As so goes California, so goes the rest of the country. Eventually. Mostly. See skateboarding, blue jeans, and… the martini?1 Okay, kelp burgers haven’t caught on. But automotively speaking, the state is a bellwether, as one can argue that hot rodding, drive-through fast food, and even the Japanese import wave began here2. So it is with great interest car people keep an eye on the trajectory of vehicle sales out West. In the current environment, that means especially the trajectory of EV sales.
And that trajectory has gone flat. Thanks to the excellent quarterly newsletter of the CNCDA (California New Car Dealers Association), leveraging Experian data, we have this chart:
The ZEV (Zero Emission Vehicle) category includes fuel cell vehicles as well as battery-electric vehicles (BEVs), but as the former’s market share rounds to about 0%, we can equate ZEV and BEV without fear of distortion.
And we can see clearly that ZEV penetration has stalled in California3. You can list more hypotheses as to why that is than I can, I bet: early-adopter demand is now satisfied, EVs are still too expensive, suburban demand with at-home chargers has been satisfied, A Certain Technoking’s political antics have turned off buyers, there was a vibe-shift election, etc., etc.
Be that as it may, but unless some electric miracle occurs, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) Advanced Clean Car Phase II (ACC2) mandate is not going to be fulfilled on time. Something will have to give… and the rest of the nation will be watching closely.
From Wikipedia: A popular theory of the origin of this drink “suggests it evolved from a cocktail called the Martinez served sometime in the early 1860s at the Occidental Hotel in San Francisco, which people frequented before taking an evening ferry to the nearby town of Martinez.” The city itself would beg to differ, claiming a more local origin for James Bond’s favorite beverage.
Toyota Motor Sales USA opened its first headquarters in a former Rambler dealership in Hollywood, in 1957. The Rest Is History.
Technically, BEVs can’t actually stall, but hey, if Elon can call Tesla power outlets Superchargers, we can stretch the terminology a bit, too. (Enzo Ferrari is probably still irate about the Pontiac GTO…)