Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to understand consumer preferences concerning electric vehicles (EV) in Portugal, based on comparisons with other vehicles with different powertrains. Design/methodology/approach – The analysis incorporated two survey-based approaches: choice-based conjoint analysis (CBC) and multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA) based. The survey interviewed 252 respondents. The criteria characterizing each vehicle are purchase price, range, fuel consumption and CO2 emissions. Another criterion was added to verify the potential of EV privileges to influence consumer preferences. A sensitivity analysis on the influence of purchase price and fuel price in the global utility of the vehicles was performed. Findings – The results showed that monetary criteria are those influencing vehicle purchase decisions the most, whereas the existence of privileges for EV owners has little relevance. EV are chosen by the consumer only if their price decreases or if gasoline and diesel prices increase sharply. The position of PHEV in the rankings makes the promotion of this type of vehicle an interesting path to exploit as potential intermediates to the diffusion of EV. Practical implications – The results underline the need of improving technical barriers of EV that are responsible for consumers’ relevant concerns and that a price subsidy could eventually be effective to increase EV sales at its current market price. Originality/value – This study compares a wide range of vehicles (conventional, hybrid and electric), addresses the Portuguese market and proposes an MCDA-based approach to obtain preference information, which is compared with a CBC approach.
Highlights
The European transportation sector raises many environmental and energy independence concerns
This model derived from Conjoint Analysis (CA) was able to reproduce correctly 73% of the choices made by the survey respondents
This study aimed to provide insight on consumer preferences for Electric Vehicles (EV) and it extends previous research in a number of ways:
Summary
The European transportation sector raises many environmental and energy independence concerns. Road transportation is associated with over 80% of this energy demand Facing this problem, the Portuguese government has been promoting energy efficiency and electric mobility through the development of programs (such as the National Plan of Action for Energy Efficiency, in the transportation sector, and the Mobi.e program, an electric mobility network supported by a technologic platform) and through specific measures to encourage the purchase of Electric Vehicles (EV) over the traditional ones (internal combustion engine vehicles), due to their potential advantages in environmental performance and oil independence. Additional policies ensued, such as a circulation tax exemption, exclusive parking places and the right to travel on high occupancy lanes These policies, which started in 2010, were not as effective as it was expected: in 2011-2012, only 289 EV were sold, according to the Automobile Association of Portugal (ACAP), mostly by public institutions and private companies. These results positioned the Portuguese market in one of the worst performances in the European transports field
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