Electric vehicles (EVs) are considered a key technology in reducing fossil fuel consumption, emissions and energy consumption. In comparison with internal combustion vehicles (ICV), EVs offer highly efficient energy usage (around three times as efficient as an ICV), zero emissions and low noise level, aspects that are necessary to improve the quality of life in urban areas.
According to the latest IEA report, global electric car stock surpassed 2 million vehicles in 2016. However, electric vehicles still only account for 0.2 per cent of all the cars in the world [ ]. In spite of this, there are still a number of barriers to be overcome in order to increase demand for EVs. The major obstacles are: the limited driving range, high investment costs, compared to ICV, the slow recharging time and the resistance to innovation. [ ].
Thomas Franke & Josef F. Krems [ ] present an excellent literature review of driving range needs of vehicles in several countries. Pearre et al. [ ] shows an interesting discussion on the limited driving range issue and aims to indicate an ideal driving range based on the consumers’ necessities in Atlanta (USA). Several studies found that in Germany 95% of cars on the road travel less than 100 km [ ]. Despite this, a survey showed that 60% of drivers in EU would not consider it acceptable to have a driving range of less than 160 km [ ]. This agrees with a recent survey in which most electric vehicles sold in recent years have a driving range over 120