Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi says that starting in 2030, the company will prevent its drivers from using the platform if they don’t own an electric vehicle.
According to some, the instigator of the taxi revolution and the entire transport industry has long announced that he wants to become carbon neutral by 2040. According to the CEO of Uber, an equally ambitious goal is, however, in shorter-term plans: the company wants all vehicles running on its platform to be electric by 2030.
A realistic goal?
Uber is not going there with mortmain with the announcement of this objective. As of this writing, just 25,000 electric vehicles are roaming the continent’s roads in Uber’s name, out of more than 1.5 million. As a rough guide, Uber needs nearly double the size of its electric fleet every year until 2030 to achieve this goal. The company must increase the size of its fleet by 67% annually until 2030.
If this task seems at first glance impossible, it would be good to remember the most recent projections of market shares that electric vehicles will monopolize in 2030.
Bloomberg, a company specializing in research and the publication of financial information, announced on September 21 that more than half of the cars that will use the roads of North America will be electric by 2030. More precisely, around 4.5% of all vehicles on the continent are currently electric, and 52% is the expected figure for 2030.
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Thus, the industry as a whole would experience an increase in electric vehicle sales of 37% per year, on average, according to these projections. In this context, the 67% that Uber must achieve may seem idealistic.
Financial aid, but not for everyone
To put the odds on its side, Uber will allocate more than one billion Canadian dollars (800 million US dollars) to developing the electric vehicle fleet. We still do not know the terms of redistributing this amount, but we know that it will not be accessible to everyone.
The United States, Canada, and Europe are the only markets targeted by the 100% electric objective. They are de facto the only markets that will be able to benefit from the financial assistance of the company. Asia, South America, Africa, and Australia/New Zealand are all shunned, largely since they represent only a small portion of the company’s revenue. Including Europe, all these markets represent only 38% of the mobility giant’s revenues, while Canada and the United States alone are responsible for the remaining 62%.
What’s more, it is often more difficult to build the infrastructure necessary for EV charging needs in areas of the world that are excluded from Uber’s goals, further limiting consumer EV ownership…