The dream of cheap electric car driving is fading away. And not only in Germany – True

Electricity prices in Germany are rising sharply, charging electric cars is becoming more expensive. Operators of large charging networks do not want to comment on future prices. Photo: EV Charge + The operators of large networks in Germany do not want to comment on the prices of charging electric cars in the coming months. It looks like the dream of driving cheap electric cars compared to cars with internal combustion engines is fading away in Germany, at least temporarily. And to blame for this is the extreme increase in electricity prices, which makes charging more expensive, not to mention the significantly higher acquisition costs when buying an electric car compared to a similar car with a combustion engine. Tariffs rise A study by German price comparison portal Verifox suggests that electricity tariffs for German households will increase by an average of 25 percent in the coming months. For a three-person household with a consumption of 4,000 kilowatt hours, this means an average annual increase of 311 euros. And the situation will rather worsen in the coming months. At the end of last week, wholesale prices on the Leipzig energy exchange jumped to a record 319 euros for one MWh with delivery in 2023. This means that an enormous price increase is coming, as a result of which one kilowatt hour costs more than 31 euro cents. Even in June, it cost 22 cents – since the beginning of the year, energy prices have risen by 310 percent. And these prices, just like the previous increase in wholesale electricity prices, will also be reflected in retail prices. Read more This is the real consumption of 72 electric cars. Mapped by a Dutchman The increase in prices for households will also significantly affect the owners of electric cars, who charge them at home using wall-boxes, and of course it is also reflected in the rates at public charging points. It looks like the dream of cheap electric car driving has ended (at least temporarily) in Germany. The average consumption of the ten electric car models that were most frequently registered in 2020 was 19 kilowatt hours (kWh) per 100 km. At an average price of electricity of 45 cents/kWh (this is what it should be in Germany in the coming months, according to Thorsten Storck, an energy expert from the Verivox portal), the current cost is 8.55 euros per hundred kilometers. It must be said that in this case we are talking about the cheapest form of charging – i.e. at home from wall-boxes. In Germany, diesel cost an average of 1.97 euros per liter in August. If we count on an average consumption of 5 liters, then a German with a diesel car will spend approximately 9.85 euros per hundred kilometers. With an average gasoline consumption of 6.5 liters per hundred kilometers and the August average price of 95-octane gasoline of EUR 1.80, a hundred kilometers will cost EUR 11.7. No one wants to comment on the prices Operators of public charging networks in Germany are not yet planning any price increases, but all without exception respond evasively, referring to the above-mentioned turbulent development on the electricity market, and they do not rule out an increase in tariffs in the coming months. Read more The highway is still ‘death’ for electric cars. This is how 36 of them lie! Prices for fast charging in Germany are currently around 55 to 60 cents per kWh, in the most expensive networks it is 70 to 80 cents per kWh. At a price of 60 cents, with an average consumption of 19 kWh, 100 electric kilometers will cost you 11.4 euros, and at a price of 80 cents, it would theoretically be up to 15.2 euros. And these are “numbers” fully comparable to fuel costs even at the current high prices of diesel and gasoline. A similar development can be expected in all European countries, and currently no one dares to predict how much one kWh will cost retail customers even in a few weeks, let alone in a few months. We ourselves are curious how this development will affect the car market and how the rise in energy prices will affect people’s willingness to pay more for an electric car and what it will do to the prices of combustion cars. However, the rise in electricity prices and the current incalculable situation in terms of calculating the costs of owning them definitely do not add to the popularity of electric cars. In Germany and nowhere else in Europe.