OREANDA-NEWS. The power of electric vehicles keeps climbing when it comes to overall market share growth. Management and technology consultancy BearingPoint’s analysis of the electric vehicle market, “Automotive – Electric Market Overview 2017,” shows that the market share development for electric and hybrid vehicles continues to be positive for most countries analyzed.

According to the market overview, Norway is the dominant leader when it comes to electric vehicle (EV) and hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) market share: 29.5% of vehicles in Norway in 2016 were either electric or hybrid electric, followed by Japan with an EV/HEV market share of 21%, and the Netherlands with 13 %. Europe’s top three EV/HEV-producing countries, Germany (1.3%), France (3.3%) and Italy (1.8%) are far behind the leaders when it comes to EV/HEV penetration. China became the global leader of electric cars sold in 2016, surpassing the US for the first time; the country’s “electric-friendly” policies make China account for more than 40% of electric cars sold worldwide.

It is clear from the study that government incentives are a big driver of EV/HEV sales, with significant increases seen in countries having the highest incentives or subsidies and decreased demand in countries where such subsidy schemes diminished in value. Incentives are a main factor why the total volume of electric and hybrid electric vehicles delivered in Europe jumped 32% in H1 2017 as compared with same period in 2016. It is expected that by the end of 2017, the total volume of electric and hybrid electric vehicles delivered in Europe will exceed 300,000.

Along with the analysis is a BearingPoint map that includes country market data for production, new registered vehicles and exports along with trends in new cars by fuel type. For the major manufacturers, Toyota has the biggest percentage of Electric & Hybrid drive (27.1%), and Volkswagen saw the biggest jump in Electric & Hybrid drive share among its fleet.