New York, Jan 20 (DPA) Electric and hybrid cars could become a realistic alternative to vehicles fitted with a combustion engine in megacities during the coming five years, according to a study conducted by McKinsey & Company, a global management consultancy firm.
New York could become the world leader with some 70,000 electric cars in the year 2015 with a percentage of 16 percent of new vehicle registrations followed by Paris with 60,000 and Shanghai with 25,000, the report found.

McKinsey conducted the research in cooperation with the cities of New York, Shanghai and the French government, analysing the market potential of electric vehicles in urban centres.

“In order to facilitate the breakthrough of electric vehicles we need to understand the early adopters and the volume customers,” said Christian Malorny, an automobile expert at McKinsey & Company.

More than half the new vehicles sold in the three cities in the year 2015 could be plug-in hybrids because they offer the advantage of using both electric drive and the conventional combustion engine to improve range.

Pure battery-powered electric vehicles could become the trend in New York where the “early adopters” were prepared to pay a lower price for a lower range.

The survey found that it is not necessary to build a network of loading stations to boost the sales of electric vehicles but that customers were quite willing to charge the batteries of their cars at home. As a next step supermarkets, parking garages and restaurants could offer their customers loading stations.

“Only in a final step would we need a large number of loading stations next to the road,” Malorny said.