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42 I Central Europe bne June 2021
Number of EVs per charging station
40
20
0
Source: National sources, Fitch Solutions
However, the region is being held back by low sales of EVs, partly caused by weak investment in charging networks, which creates “range anxiety” and deters purchases.
Also, the incentives offered by Central European governments to encourage electric car sales are much less generous than in Western Europe, while incomes are lower, putting EVs out of the reach of most people, particularly as the EV second-hand market is not yet well developed. Hiking taxes on petrol and diesel would be another way to encourage people to shift to EVs but this raises issues of equity, as it would hit the many poor Central Europeans still driving 20-year-old cars around their much improved roads.
The result is that while the proportion
of pure EVs sold in the EU more than trebled in 2020 to reach 10.5% – up from 3% in 2019 – EV sales still only represent less than 2% of new car sales across Central Europe, with Hungary leading Czechia and well ahead of Poland and Slovakia.
Lagging sales are bound to affect EV investment in the region in the long run, even if for the immediate future cars will be still mainly shipped west. Central Europe’s lack of ambition in electric mobility – as demonstrated by the current Next Generation EU fund plans currently being submitted to the European Commission – could therefore end up costing it dearly.
Below, bne IntelliNews reporters from the four Central European countries examine the EV revolution in their countries and assess which of them is currently leading the regional race for foreign investment (FDI) to transform their carmaking industries.
Czechia
The Czech Republic has Central Europe’s only significant home-grown car brand, Skoda Auto, which after its takeover by VW in 1994 has become the German carmak- ers’ value brand. Skoda already produces several plug-in hybrid models but it is now set to become part of VW’s ambitious plans to be the world’s leading EV producer by 2025, a year in which it aims that one in five VW cars sold will be electric.
After spending €32mn on converting
the Mlada Boleslav plant, Skoda began rolling out the Enyaq IV last year, the brand’s first fully electric vehicle, based on VW’s mass-market platform for battery-powered cars. It is adding a coupe version and has plans for a smaller EV
by 2025 and a mid-sized one later in the decade. Skoda also produces high-voltage batteries at its Mlada Boleslav plant.
Marketing director Martin Jahn said recently that Skoda will not be among the fastest carmakers in going electric, as it is strong in slow adopting markets, but chairman Thomas Schäfer insists that it will still be fully electric in 10 years. Skoda Auto plans to invest €1.4bn over the next five years into EVs.
Hyundai, which operates the country’s second-largest car plant in Nosovice, also started EV production last year, with the Kona Electric battery-electric vehicle rolling off the production lines, the first electric car to be manufactured by Hyundai outside Korea. Toyota’s Kolin plant intends to start producing hybrid models later this year.
In terms of batteries, there is great excitement over VW’s announcement
in March that it plans to build six gigafactories, with a total capacity of 240 GWh, enough to produce cells for almost 5mn cars annually. One of these factories will be sited in either Poland, Slovakia or the Czech Republic by 2027.
European top 20 full electric vehicles (BEV) in % of new car registrations
60
54%
50 40 30 20 10
0
20%
2020 2019
10% 8% 7% 7% 7% 7% 6% 6% 5% 5% 5% 4% 3% 3% 2% 2% 2% 2% 2%
Source: ACEA, ING Economics Department
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