Leaving aside the fact that I don’t understand the logic behind why you would cancel your EV order because Elon Musk is going back to Tesla – when Tesla’s aren’t even on the scheme……
I agree that EV prices will have to drop in order to improve take up levels, but whether that will happen in the next few months is possibly optimistic. It is true that the arrival of a new wave of Chinese EVs will certainly put pressure on European manufacturers, although given the general poor quality and lack of longevity of many other Chinese made consumer goods, it remains to be seen whether U.K. consumers will embrace them in vast numbers. Fleet users (who form the vast majority of EV consumers) may be inclined to stick with brands that they know and love and, as we know, private buyers, who may be more inclined towards a budget priced product, aren’t embracing EVs.
I also don’t think it’s a given that lower up front costs will, in itself, get the EV market to where it needs to be, as this is only one of the issues that is stopping private buyers from embracing them. Concerns remain over low residual values, high insurance costs, range limitations (especially in winter), real range versus claimed range, concerns over battery degradation over time and cost (and viability) to replace (I don’t think that this is an issue now, but concerns remain), not to mention the biggest elephant in the room that, as you say, if you can’t charge at home (which tens of millions can’t) then it will cost more to run than an economical ICE car. Plus, of course, there’s the longer term question mark over how governments will recoup the lost fuel revenues (which they will have to do) and whether that will result in some form of charge per mile driven, which ultimately would challenge EVs biggest current advantage (lower running costs if you can charge at home).
The simple fact remains that market demand for EVs is not tracking the ZEV target trajectory and the recent minor softening of them isn’t going to address that. I remain of the view that as each year goes by, whichever government is in power at the time will finally have to wake up to the fact that you can set all the targets that you like, but you cannot force consumers to buy something that they simply don’t want!