Electric and hybrid car registrations in Germany rise but SUVs take lead

The number of pure electric new car registrations in Germany rose by more than 75 percent in 2019 with 63,281 new registrations, writes the Federal Motor Transport Authority (KBA). Pure electric cars therefore made up 1.8 percent of all new registrations, compared to one percent in 2018. New registrations of vehicles with hybrid drive rose by more than 83 percent compared to the previous year, making up 6.6 percent of all new registrations. Meanwhile, SUVs and all-terrain vehicles saw the highest increases of 21 and 20 percent respectively. Overall, 3.6 million new cars went on German roads in 2019, an increase of five percent compared to the previous year and the second-highest level since 2000, writes Frankfurter Allgemeine.

Germany’s world-famous carmakers have turned to face the challenge of electric mobility, but are still betting heavily on their polluting SUVs to finance tomorrow's clean alternatives. At the end of December, German car manufacturer Volkswagen announced it expects to reach its target of producing one million electric cars by 2023, two years before previously predicted, and is preparing for production of the company's first all-electric SUV this year.