Battery electric vehicles led the surge, with an 8.4 per cent share in Q4. For 2022 as a whole, one in every 11 new vehicles registered was a ZEV, finds S&P Global Mobility

Canada’s zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) registrations hit an important, new milestone in Q4 2022: double-digit market share.

According to the latest quarterly Canadian automotive report from S&P Global Mobility, battery-electric (BEV) and plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEV) accounted for 10.2 per cent of all new vehicle registrations in the final three months of last year.

For 2022 as a whole, meanwhile, one in every 11 vehicles registered — 8.9 per cent — was a ZEV.

“Not only has the market share of ZEVs increased, but the overall volume of ZEVs has also seen a substantial growth. Year over year, the total volume of ZEVs in Canada has increased by 38.8%,” reads the report.

For battery electric vehicles, specifically, market share in Q4 2022 hit 8.4 per cent, up from 8.0 per cent in Q3. Plug-in hybrids, meanwhile, made up 1.8 per cent of registrations in Q4, up from 1.5 per cent in Q3.

For the year overall, BEVs were at 7.0 per cent and PHEVs at 1.9 per cent.

(Note: S&P Global, like Statistics Canada, classifies BEVs and PHEVs as “zero-emission vehicles.” The grouping does not reflect Electric Autonomy‘s view, which considers only non-combustion engine vehicles to be zero-emission. However, where statistics in this report refer to ZEVs, we have adhered to the S&P Global definition for consistency.)

Provincial , municipal gains

At regional and local levels, ZEV registrations in Q4 2022 showed striking gains.

Of the vehicles registered in British Columbia during the fourth quarter, 20.1 per cent were ZEVs (up from 19.9 per cent in Q3). That gave the province an 18.1 per cent year-end market share of ZEVs — the highest in Canada.

Quebec followed B.C. with 14.6 per cent ZEV registrations in Q4 (up from 13.3 per cent in Q3) and 13.2 per cent for all of 2022.

Yukon surged into third place in Q4 2022, with a stunning leap to 11.9 per cent ZEV market share, compared to 5.8 per cent in Q3.

In Ontario, the share of ZEV registrations rose to 8.3 per cent in Q4 2022 (up from 7.6 per cent in Q3), giving it 6.9 per cent for the year in total.

From a volume standpoint, however, the provinces stacked up differently. For all of 2022, Quebec led the country with a 36.7 per cent market share. Ontario was second, at 31.5 per cent, while B.C. ranked third, at 23.9 per cent.

Among the three major Census Metropolitan Areas, Vancouver hit another major milestone in Q4 2022, as ZEVs reached 25 per cent market share — one in four new vehicles registered there were ZEVs.

For the year, Vancouver also led with a 22.5 per cent market share, Montreal was second at 16 per cent, and Toronto third at 9.4 per cent.

In terms of volume growth, Toronto outpaced the others with a 107 per cent increase in 2022, says the report, adding: “These three CMAs constitute 58% of the total ZEV volume in Canada.”

Positive indicators for the future

While 2022 was a major growth year overall for ZEV sales across Canada, registrations picked up speed in the second half of the year, with the strongest showing in Q4 — providing momentum heading into 2023.

Nearly every province and territory saw greater year-over-year adoption in 2022 compared to 2021 (with the exception of Northwest Territories) as well as steady, quarter-by-quarter increases (with the exception of NWT, Nunavut, Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia).

In terms of urban-rural split, urban areas account for 85.6 per cent of ZEV registrations in 2022, slightly outpacing the urban market’s 80.6 per cent share of light-duty vehicle registrations overall.

Adoption rates did increase in both urban and rural markets, however. The former reached 9.4 per cent in 2022, up from 5.9 per cent in 2021, while the latter reached 6.5 per cent, an increase from the 4.4 per cent rate in 2021.

Tesla continues to be the top-selling EV brand in Canada for light-duty vehicles. The U.S.-based automaker is responsible for between 40-50 per cent of new ZEVs in Q4.

“According to the 2023 S&P Global Mobility Sales-based Powertrain forecast, released August 2022, the market share for ZEVs in Canada is projected to continue to grow and reach 11.3% for 2023, on 1.6 million vehicles in Canada,” concludes the report.

To access S&P’s Q4 2022 summary visit here.