Demand surged for new-energy vehicles: sales volume significantly up in Q1

Shanghai Metal Market reports that according to China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM), China’s new-energy vehicles sales ascended more than double this quarter. This is a year-on-year growth as the country has been facing an overall growing demand for new-energy vehicles.

In the period January to March, China witnessed around 154 per cent of growth in new-energy vehicle sales, totalling 143,000 units compared to the corresponding period last year. On the other hand, output closed at 150,000 units, up 157 per cent year-on-year.

To say the truth, sales of new-energy passenger vehicles surged as well by 102 per cent to close at 55,723 units in March and 116,918 units, up 136 per cent in the entire Q1 compared to the same period of previous year, according to the data revealed by China Passenger Car Association on April 10, 2018.

As to specific vehicle types, while pure electric passenger vehicles saw YoY 78 per cent sales growth to close at 40,947 units in March and 79,537 unit sales in the entire first quarter, plug-in hybrid passenger vehicles reached 14,776 units in March, up 220 per cent and 37, 380 units during the first quarter, compared to the contemporary period previous year.

By this skyrocketing growth, industry participants believe that 2018 is going to be a game-changer relating to new-energy vehicles in China. The production would shift from relying on government subsidies to being supported by actual market demand, according to Shanghai Securities News Report. This in turn going to be a huge demand boost for aluminium bodied new-energy vehicles that are cheaper than carbon fibre and would also significantly lead to an enhancement of light body weight cars.

On the other hand, China’s total automobile did not miss to taste the success either by hitting the sales volume 7.18 million units, up 2.8 per cent from the last year, although year-on-year output was down 1.4 per cent, standing at 7.02 million units.