A group of 27 private companies, one environmental group and two European government organizations commissioned McKinsey & Company to assess the role of battery electric vehicles, plug-in hybrids and fuel cell electric vehicles in achieving significant reductions of CO2 emissions from road transportation by 2050.
Released on November 9, the study is based on more than 10,000 confidential and proprietary data points that participating companies provided to McKinsey & Company. This data included information about costs (vehicle costs, operating costs, fuels and infrastructure costs), performance, efficiency and emissions across the entire value chain.
The study recommends a balanced scenario for the electrification of passenger cars in the EU and that fuel cell vehicles play a significant role.
“Family sized cars (medium/large) account for 50% of all cars and 75% of CO2 emissions. FCEVs are technologically ready and, in the medium to long term, are the best low-carbon substitute for this segment. Incentives could make FCEVs cost-competitive as early as 2020. The costs for a hydrogen infrastructure are approximately 5% of the overall costs of FCEVs over the coming decades. This is comparable to rolling out a charging infrastructure for BEVs and PHEVs.”
