Nissan expects electric car sales to represent 20% of its business in Europe by 2020

Some automakers have disclosed sales targets for electric cars and they are kind of all over the place. Most of them are for 2025 or later and target for 20 to 30% of their total business.

When it comes to more short-term targets, they are rare, which makes a recent statement from a Nissan executive interesting. 

In reaction to France’s announcement that they will ban gas- and diesel-powered cars by 2040, Gareth Dunsmore, Electric Vehicle (EV) Director for Nissan Europe, told Reuters this week that the company was aiming for  electric car sales to represent 20% of its business in Europe by 2020:

“By 2020, where the market conditions are right, I’m confident we’ll be selling up to 20 percent of our volume as zero emissions vehicles and this will only grow,”

It’s particularly interesting since it’s only 3 years from now and Nissan is a major player in Europe with over 600,000 deliveries per year in the market.

Currently, its electric vehicle offering is limited to the Nissan Leaf and the E-NV200 electric van, which represents less than 5% of its sales in Europe and can barely reach 30,000 units.

In order to reach that goal, they would have to increase that to 150,000 electric cars per year in Europe alone.

Maybe it’s a show of confidence in the upcoming next generation Nissan Leaf that is expected by the end of the year. The new vehicle with more range and features could boost sales of Nissan’s first all-electric vehicle, which have peaked.

But it would seem Nissan needs to increase its electric vehicle lineup in order to achieve this goal and it’s something that Nissan’s new CEO hinted would come by the end of the decade.

It’s easy to see how it would be achievable with a total of 3 or 4 different electric cars in their lineup even though it’s a more aggressive goal than any other major legacy automaker.