The U.S. is not keeping up with other global markets, however. BloombergNEF predicts China and Europe will continue to be the dominant EV markets between now and 2025, thanks to regulations and government programs in those areas. Hurdles in the U.S. (and, in some cases, globally) include EV affordability and availability, as well as public charging infrastructure. Will the next five years see a shift in this reality?

EV Trends

Jeff Allen, executive director of Forth Mobility, says the EV space just keeps moving faster and further every year. “One key trend right now is that the technology, especially around batteries and their management, has gotten much better and cheaper,” Allen says. “Another trend is that policy support for transportation electrification has gotten much stronger at every political level, in part as the urgency of addressing climate change has become more clear. Finally, we have seen extremely ambitious investments and announcements from both incumbent automakers and newcomers to the space. These trends seem to be combining into a ‘virtuous circle’ that is driving electric vehicle production and sales far faster than seemed likely just a couple of years ago.”

Olivier Trescases, professor of electrical engineering, director of the UTEV (University of Toronto Electric Vehicle Research Centre), and Canada Research Chair in power electronic converters, says EV technology is rapidly evolving, and he is seeing many technologies transition from the lab to the road. He lists trends such as V2G (vehicle-to-grid) power transfer, digital twins, in-situ state-of-health battery monitoring, and innovative charging methods as important trends in the space.

“Future EVs will be considered as versatile programmable mobile power sources and energy buffers, where the bi-directional onboard charger can be used to transfer power back to the grid,” Trescases explains. “This implies that EVs will be an integral part of renewable energy integration since their batteries can buffer the intermittent nature of solar and wind. In remote locations and during natural disasters, which are becoming more frequent and severe, EVs will provide mobile emergency backup power.”

The technology is here, but the business models are still evolving, Trescases says. Who will bear the costs of V2G technology integration—the OEM (original-equipment manufacturer), the owner, the electrical utility, the municipality? Trescases says he and his team have been working on leveraging a new semiconductor technology, Gallium Nitride, to enable V2G with the highest efficiency and smallest physical footprint in the vehicle.

Another EV trend is the use of digital twins to create simulation models of individual EVs that track their performance over time. The use of digital twins in industries like manufacturing, agriculture, energy and utilities, and healthcare, as well as the automotive industry, is a broader IoT (Internet of Things) trend. In fact, according to the latest data from ResearchandMarkets.com, the digital-twin market will reach $63.5 billion by 2027.

“Onboard cellular telematics have always enabled basic data capture and over-the-air software updates, but there is a migration towards much richer datasets that reveal the in-depth operation of the EV in realtime,” adds Trescases. “This vehicle-specific data will be used to create a cloud-based ‘digital twin’—a simulation model of the EV that tracks the performance and degradation of each individual EV over its lifetime. The amount of data is staggering, and yet the benefits in terms of predictive maintenance, fleet optimization, disaster response, design optimization, and lifetime prediction are very exciting.”

EV charging innovations are also in the works. For instance, there are companies and labs working on integrating the DC fast charging with the motor drive system. “At the core, the idea is to repurpose the electric motor when the car is stationary as a power filter to enable low-cost fast-charging onboard,” Trescases says. “This has the game-changing potential to reduce the cost of or even eliminate the bulky DC fast charger hardware that sits outside of the vehicles at charging stations.” Wireless charging is also maturing as costs come down.  

Mika Kanninen, CEO of Akkurate, a software provider that helps EV ecosystem actors understand the history and current state of health of EV batteries, adds another trend to the discussion—the fact that EVs are part of a much bigger picture in how mobility is changing. “With autonomous driving and new business models such as mobility-as-a-service, electric vehicles will become part of a larger system and will no longer be so much individual devices,” Kanninen says. “The car will be an integral part of the software platform that OEMs are now rushing to develop and that is central to the customer experience. This development will be pivotal for the success of an OEM.”

Cost is also a barrier to adoption. Jennifer Weiss, senior policy associate for climate and energy at Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, points out that EVs are still financially out of reach for many consumers. “The newest EV versions of vehicles have a higher upfront cost than their ICE counterparts, making the EV transition a bit harder for financially challenged consumers,” Weiss says. “In addition, many auto dealers do not carry a large inventory of electric vehicles, making it difficult for consumers to test drive and compare.”

Alan Jenn, assistant director and assistant professional researcher for the Institute of Transportation Studies at the University of California, Davis, agrees, saying EV pricing relative to their gas counterparts is perhaps the biggest hurdle to adoption. However, this will change. “As battery technology improves and economies of scale ramp up, the costs of production will ultimately fall,” Jenn says. “This will be a matter of when, not if.”

Jenn also points to the limited availability of EVs in many segments as another reason the technology hasn’t become as mainstream as it could be. “However, as more vehicle models come out, we should begin to see growth of the market into portions of the population that previously haven’t considered the technology—particularly in the compact SUV and light-duty truck segments,” he says.

Another hurdle, which may be more psychological than anything, is range anxiety. “Range is somewhat of an issue, but I would argue more perceptual than real,” explains Sanchez. “Multiple studies have shown the average number of miles driven by a typical U.S. commuter is about 40 miles. This is well within the range of almost all EVs on the market, even those with a shorter range.”