The age of the Spanish fleet is in 13.5 years on average, a figure that continues to grow (it is believed to be closer to 14 years) and that worries the authorities. A study carried out by the European Association of Automobile Manufacturers (ACEA) has shown this data and others that help us to make a complete x-ray of the situation of the sector at a national level. There are also other issues such as its distribution by fuelbeing in a position below the European average.
It is estimated that there are currently 25.34 million vehicles in Spain and most of them are quite old. Almost two thirds of the total (63.6%) are cars that are more than ten years old, while 16.24% are between five and ten years old, leaving a 20.11% of vehicles that are five years old or less. We are still far from other countries such as Romania with 86.65% of cars over ten years old, Greece with 83.82% or Poland with 80.55%; but we’re supposed to be further apart.
Because on the other side of the scale are countries like Luxembourg, which only has 25.13% of vehicles that exceed the decade. The same happens with Belgium with its 34.1% or with Denmark and its 35.1%. In the middle term, but still ahead of our country would be others such as Italy (58.98%), France (51.33%), Germany (43.33%) or the United Kingdom (41.58%). In addition, in Spain it must be taken into account that the 56.9% of vehicles are dieselprecisely the fuel that has been most sought after in recent years.
There are others with more dependence on diesel such as Lithuania (67.8%), Latvia (65%) or Portugal (59.1%). Continuing by the distribution, in our country, 39.5% are gasoline cars and a minimum part is taken by the most respectful with the environment. We are talking about just one 2.7% hybrid cars or 0.3% electric, adding to them another 0.3% of LPG vehicles and 0.1% of CNG. In this data, we are far from ideal, since there is the extraordinary case of Norway with its 16.2% of electric cars, followed by Iceland with 4.6% and the Netherlands with 2.8%.
It is clear that we are not in the ideal situation and the concern is greater if we take into account that there are not many measures to reverse it either. Car prices continue to rise and electric cars are out of reach for most drivers. It is true that there are some purchase incentive plans such as MOVES, although it seems that this is not enough based on the data provided by ACEA. Only time will tell if the fleet can be rejuvenated in time.
Source: ACEA
