Growth in electric vehicle sales slows as normal people remain skeptical of them

The Associated Press reports that new vehicle sales in the U.S. rose nearly 5 percent from January through March despite higher interest rates. However, the same was not true for electric vehicles, as sales growth slowed in the first quarter due to buyers being wary of limited range and a lack of charging stations.

Sales of electric vehicles grew only 2.7 percent to just over 268,000 during the quarter, far below the 47 percent growth that fueled record sales and a 7.6 percent market share last year. Given the large increase in the previous year, a slowdown in growth isn’t surprising.

However, the reasons for the slowing growth in EV sales are important. According to the AP:

The slowdown, led by Tesla, confirms automakers’ fears that they moved too quickly to pursue EV buyers. The EV share of total U.S. sales fell to 7.1 percent in the first quarter.

Nearly all of the early adopters and people concerned about internal-combustion engines’ impact on the planet have bought electric vehicles, and now automakers are facing more skeptical mainstream buyers, Edmunds Director of Insights Ivan Drury said.

“That’s where all of those headwinds come in that we’ve seen in survey data,” Drury said. “Those real-world concerns about charging infrastructure, battery life, insurance costs.”

The remaining number of folks who have yet to purchase an electric vehicle as an eco-vanity project is dwindling, and the normies are -rightly- unconvinced that EVs are a one-to-one replacement for their current conventional cars. As a result, they’re unwilling to pay a price premium upfront for an EV when they know they’ll still need a regular car in the household for the foreseeable future.