UKRAINIANS ARE LEFT WITHOUT POWER WHILE BUYING ELECTRIC CARS
Ukraine's electric paradox: in most regions, Ukrainians are left without electricity for 8-12 hours a day, yet are breaking records in purchasing electric cars.
In June, two of my neighbors bought the same e-cars. There are quite a few BMW I3s in Kyiv this summer, as they cost about $12,500.
For Serhii, a retired businessman, this price was quite manageable and allowed his wife to finally start driving herself. The car’s preferred maximum speed is 60 km/h (37 mph). For Tetiana, Serhii’s wife, who is still afraid to drive on her own, this speed is very comfortable, and the car itself feels quite accommodating.
Another neighbor, Maksym, 38, says that the electric car helps him save a great deal, especially considering the skyrocketing prices of petrol, needed for the generator.
“I took a trip to Bila Tserkva (80 km, or 50 mi, from Kyiv) for just 500 hryvnias (less than $20)! And I drove 160 km (roughly 100 mi) at the maximum speed, although manufacturers claim that the car lasts 130 km (80 mi) only,” Maksym proudly shares.
Despite the ongoing war, the number of electric cars purchased by Ukrainians is rising each year. A record-breaking number of e-cars – over 37,000 – were imported to Ukraine in 2023. This was 4 times more than in 2021. In Ukraine, Volkswagen, Tesla, and Nissan are the top electric car brands. Lviv region leads in the number of registrations of such vehicles.
Overall, electric cars account for 12.9% of the total number of imported vehicles. Of all the electric cars, the most popular brands among Ukrainians are:
Tesla – 4,742;
Volkswagen – 3,194;
Nissan – 3,034.
Last year, Lviv was the leading region for electric car imports, accounting for 13.5%, with Kyiv (13.1%) and Odesa (9.3%) coming next.
This year, the growth trend in electric car purchases in Ukraine continues. In June, Ukraine saw the registration of 4,200 e-cars, a 2.4% increase from May and a 35% rise compared to the number of cars bought the previous year. In total, more than 24.4 thousand battery-powered vehicles were registered in Ukraine in the first half of 2024, of which 20% were new. If the trend continues, this year will break the records of the past. The Honda M-NV was added to the list of Ukrainian favorites.
The fashion for electric cars in Ukraine began long before the war. The Nissan Leaf fit in well with the traffic flows of big cities like Kyiv, Lviv, and Odesa. In 2022, after the full-scale invasion, the Ukrainian economy tanked in general, so people were buying much less, including cars. However, as you can see, interest in electric cars resumed in the second year of the war. Today, you can often see a fancy Tesla in the Kyiv region and in Kyiv. They are mostly bought used at a price of up to $20 thousand.
There may be several reasons for such an interest in e-cars. In addition to the aforementioned savings in gasoline, which costs $1.3 per liter and is now used by Ukrainians for generators, it is also a sense of the global trend towards greening and climate protection. The state of the environment in Ukraine has deteriorated significantly due to the war. In general, the air condition is deteriorating in two ways due to the hostilities:
direct impact - detonation of various types of ammunition and the use of artillery, missiles, and bombs;
indirect impact - fires in ecosystems, shells hitting oil depots and other industrial facilities.
“120 million tons of carbon dioxide - this is the amount of additional emissions caused by Russia's armed aggression against Ukraine,” said Ruslan Strilets, Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources of Ukraine, earlier this year.
E-cars often charge very quickly, and it takes Maksym just an hour to get his BMW fully charged. Yesterday, we had no power for more than 24 hours and met Maksym again in his electric car. He explained that he was unable to leave in a regular car: due to the lack of electricity, his garage simply did not open, and his electric car was parked in the yard.