New registrations of electric cars in the EU dipped slightly in June, despite significant growth in Croatia, Czechia, and Hungary.
Registrations of battery-electric cars declined by 1% in the EU last month, to 156,408 units, the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA) said on Thursday.
The total market share of these vehicles dropped from 15.1% to 14.4%, compared to the same month a year earlier.
This was despite robust annual increases in a number of countries, notably Croatia (+161.4), Czechia (+140.8), and Hungary (+123.8).
Respectively, these nations registered 298; 1,524; and 864 new battery electric cars in June.
To rank numbers as opposed to growth rates, Germany stormed ahead with 43,412 new battery electric registrations, followed by France (29,837) and Belgium (13,714).
Outside of the EU but in Europe, the UK registered 34,034 of these vehicles.
Countries that saw the largest year-on-year decline in electric battery registrations were Ireland (-52.2), Romania (-45.3), Latvia (-42.5), and Lithuania (-42.0).
Outside of the EU, Iceland saw a -76.4 decline.
Notable changes were also seen in Belgium (+50.4%), Italy (+117.4%), Germany (-18.1%), the Netherlands (-15%), and France (-10.3%).
“Germany is the sick man of Europe when it comes to electric cars,” said Lucien Mathieu, cars director at European campaign group Transport & Environment (T&E).
Cited by Reuters, he stressed that markets with predictable incentives for EV adoption were “reaping the rewards”.
In December, Germany brought an early end to subsidies for buying EVs as part of a 2024 budget deal.
To turn to petrol cars, meanwhile, sales remained relatively stable in June.
Registrations declined by just 0.7% as falls in France (-20.2%) and Spain (-7.5%) were counterbalanced by growth in Germany (+12.1%) and Italy (+6.9%).
As a result, petrol cars now represent 34.4% of the market, down from 36.2% in June last year.
For all types of vehicles, the Volkswagen Group dominated sales, eating up 25.8% of the monthly market share. The firm is followed by Stellantis (15.7%) and the Renault Group (10.9%).