The Real Reason EV Adoption Is Slowing

It is undeniable that EV adoption in Ireland has slowed significantly in the last year.

For example, registrations of new electric vehicles have fallen 19.1% between January-April 2024 compared with the same period in the previous year. As a result, many sections of the Irish press have been querying the cause over recent weeks.

Yet, Ireland is an outlier in this respect. As Bloomberg noted in March 2024, electric cars have passed the tipping point to mass adoption in 31 counties, up from just 19 countries in 2022.

As such, it is clear that Ireland is doing something uniquely wrong as we further jeopardise our climate and emissions targets.

So, what is it that makes countries like Ireland so unique when it comes to stalling EV sales?

Last July, they cut the grants for EVs, which led to a massive spike in dealers pre-registering vehicles before an enormous drop-off. So significant was the almost immediate decline in sales, that from September to December EV registrations were below 2022 levels for the same period.

It was already apparent that EV grants weren’t working and that more assistance was needed – not less. Fantastic research from Trinity College Dublin showed that EV grants were mostly helping those who already had the means to change, who were typically buying an EV as a second or third car rather than replacing an ICE.

As the cost-of-living and Climate Crises have significantly worsened over recent years, the Government has systematically failed to make EVs accessible to those who would benefit most from lower running costs.

Calls to remove import duties, to make available interest-free loans and other measures to help people on lower incomes access the benefits of electric vehicles have fallen on wilfully deaf ears.

Yet, in spite of their continued abject failure, the Irish Government may not be the most influential figure in stemming EV adoption.

We challenged the journalist responsible for this article to provide evidence to support this claim. Brian Finn admitted that he was unable to and, in fact, asked us to provide evidence to the contrary, claiming that he had friends that were making the switch.

It is not beholden on us to disprove misinformation – it is a matter of journalistic integrity to have data to support your claims. And the truth is that there is no independent or academic data anywhere in Europe to support these claims on any trustworthy scale.

In short, this is Ireland’s national broadcaster boldly stating misinformation alongside tired old tropes like ‘range anxiety.’ This is the media playing an active role in delaying EV adoption.

This isn’t a one-off. And perhaps there can be no better example than that shown recently in The i.

On 29th March, Emma Henderson, a former food journalist, wrote an article titled “I sold my electric car and went back to diesel – I’d had enough.”

The article followed a so-called #journorequest on Twitter – used by journalists to find contributors to a story.

She received 113 replies to her tweet. She did not receive a single response that supported her premise. She did, however, get over 100 replies from people telling her that they had swapped from ICE to EV and would never go back.

Could it really be that this freelancer who ‘specialises in writing about food and drink, sustainability, and reducing single-use plastics’ really wrote such a negative article because of user error – that she failed to plan ahead when needing to charge and chose to use her national platform to promote myths, misinformation and a wholly one-sided view of electric vehicles?

Surely a journalist who ‘specialises in sustainability’ would at least include some context about the Climate Emergency or the impact on public health when writing an article that seeks to justify or advocate for switching from ICEs to EVs.

Of course not.

Instead, Henderson’s article states: “According to the UK-wide independent car supermarket Motorpoint, 56 per cent of EV drivers part-exchanged for an alternative fuel type in 2023, with petrol dominating the choice at 30 per cent.”

We contacted Motorpoint to clarify this, as this sounded like an alarmingly high figure – and as the central piece of data used by Henderson to build her whole article around, perhaps it offered some insight into a worrying new trend…

Nope.

Of course, this is a spurious PR survey in the same way that the Motorpoint survey is, but if that is the benchmark that national news publications are willing to use as the basis for their disinformation articles, then surely this is just as valid by the same logic.

Since we challenged Henderson on her platforming of spurious data and disinformation, a small caveat has been added at the foot of the article stating “An RAC study from 2021 found 90% of EV owners won’t switch back to petrol or diesel cars.”

She has not come back to us on our emails, questioning the validity of this article, the inherent bias it contained. Nor did she answer our questions about the fact that she had almost exclusively platformed high-wealth edge cases, such as someone stating they couldn’t possibly drive an EV with anything less than 500 miles of range, when the average car journey in the UK is just 8.4 miles.

Henderson’s article in The i – which is owned by the Daily Mail – relies on spurious data, prominent EV misinformation figures like Harry Metcalfe (who is also a long-time climate denier), and an inherent bias that stuck with a hit piece approach while ignoring all opportunities for balance and the overwhelming appeals of EV owners wishing to share their good stories in response to her Journo Request.

Like the RTE piece, it also lacks any reference to the vital context of the Climate Emergency.

Is it any wonder that 87% of all car sales in Ireland in 2024 are entirely reliant on fossil fuels when parts of our press peddles totally unfounded misinformation or platforms denial, and our Government is still lying to us about meeting climate targets that we look doomed to miss by a wide mark.

Until there is greater press and political accountability, we will continue to fail. We urge our readers to continue calling out journalists who platform misinformation and disinformation, or who continue to write hit pieces that overlook the realities of the Climate Emergency.

What To Read Next