Determining the share of renewable electricity in electric vehicle charging in Europe

Plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) are considered a promising option to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in transport. The electricity used for charging is decisive for the environmental assessment of PEVs. Most studies on the environmental performance of PEV assume carbon intensity according to the average electricity grid mix for charging. This article provides a systematic overview of existing studies on charging shares at home, work, and public charging points and provides new empirical and statistical data on the contracted renewable electricity shares at these locations. As a result, we obtain a contracted share of 57 – 66 % of renewables in the charged electricity for PEVs in Europe in 2022 with 61 % as most likely value, i.e. higher than the total contracted share of 49 % in the electricity mix. The data used covers 94 % of the European PEV market. Our results show that the actual share of renewables in electricity contracts for home, work and public charging is higher than in the European grid mix. Despite discussions around the methodological use of contracted renewable electricity, our findings imply that many previous studies underestimate the share of renewable electricity in PEV charging which implies underestimation of well-to-wheel life-cycle benefits of PEV in parts of the literature. Future research should analyse charging behaviour and renewable usage in PEV charging more broadly empirically.