EV sales up 85 per cent in Europe

Sales of pure-electric (EV) cars rose by 85 per cent across Europe in March despite total numbers of vehicles declining for the seventh month in a row.

One of the biggest surprise winners in March was US pure-electric car-maker Tesla who moved in to Europe's top 25 biggest-selling brands as sales of pure-electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles surpassed 100,000 units for the first time with a total of 125,400 cars registered.

Behind Tesla's rise through the ranks was a significant bump in sales for the Model 3 that jumped from 3747 units in February to 15,755 cars sold in March – with the Model 3 becoming Europe's best-selling electric car.

While plug-in sales flourished diesel-powered cars continued their fall from favour among European buyers.

Last month saw the lowest monthly market share for diesel in September 2000, with just 31.2 per cent of all sales accounting for the fuel, down from 36.2 per cent in March 2018 and 44.8 per cent in March 2017.

Despite the continued fall, analysts have predicted diesel to sales to continue to fall post Volkswagen's Dieselgate emissions scandal.

In March, Europe's best-selling car remained the Golf with 46,364 registered, with Volkswagen leading its rivals for sales, with a total of 184,470 cars sold.

According to sales analyst Jato Dynamics, just over 4.13 million new cars were registered across Europe in the first quarter of 2019 – a 3.2 per cent drop year-on-year.