Hybrid hype: why fully electric vehicles will win the race

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  The Economist. Hi, this is Tom Lee Devlin,

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  co-host of Money Talks, our weekly podcast on markets, the economy and business.

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  Welcome to Editor's Picks.

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  Here's an article handpicked from the latest edition of The Economist read aloud.

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  The card industry's effort to decarbonize revolves around replacing petrol with batteries.

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  A growing number of customers want both.

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  Buyers who cannot afford a fully electric car or worry about the availability of charging points are turning to plug-in hybrid electric vehicles,

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  or PHEVs, sales of which are rocketing.

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  But the hype for hybrids may prove to be short-lived.

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  Worldwide sales of cars running purely on batteries, BEVs,

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  were more than double those of PHEVs last year.

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  But the gap has been rapidly closing.

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  Sales of PHEVs were up by almost 50% year on year in the first seven months of 2024 compared with just 8% for BEVs,

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  according to estimates from Bernstein, a broker.

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  Carmakers have been cooling on BEVs and warming to hybrids.

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  This month, Volvo backtracked on its commitment to go all-electric by 2030.

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  It now says BEVs and PHEVs will together account for 90% of its sales by the end of the decade.

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  Last month,

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  Ford announced that it was abandoning plans to make a large fully electric SUV,

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  opting instead for hybrid power.

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