South Korea has finalized a five-year plan aimed at increasing exports of eco-friendly automobiles by three times by 2025. In 2020, Korea exported 276,000 units of green cars, up by 6.8 pc, while electric vehicle (EV) exports rose to 121,825 units, a jump of 60pc from the prior year.
In 2025, export of eco-friendly cars including EVs and hydrogen cars is forecast to reach 830,000 units, according to South Korea’s Ministry of Trade. The country ranked the fourth-largest exporter of EVs in 2020 and the leading producer of hydrogen fuel-cell cars. Exports of green cars have increased over threefold in the past five years and are expected to grow at the same rate by 2025. The share of eco-friendly car export is forecast to be 35pc of Korea’s total car exports in 2025.
In January, green car exports grew by 76.5pc to 32,035 units with EV exports up 57.5pc at 9,571 units, growing for 42 consecutive months.
As part of the COVID-19 stimulus, the Korean government will launch a five-year K-New Deal Fund in March which plans to invest $3.5 trillion in 2021 for various green projects and aims to bring 1.13mn EVs and 200,000 hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles on-roads by 2025. The Green New Deal focuses on building a high-tech, high-wage green industry with strong export potential.
Recently, BHP reviewed its long term outlook for global electric vehicles penetration. BHP expects EVs to constitute 17pc of the light vehicle fleet by 2035, which would translate to 314mn EVs sold, higher than its previous estimate of 275mn. In 2035, EVs are forecast to constitute 41pc of total annual auto sales.