A study raises the alarm: plug-in hybrid cars are not using their electric motors

Plug-in hybrid cars were created to be an intermediate step between internal combustion engines and fully electric vehicles. Their purpose was to get drivers to use the electric motor on short trips and to reserve the fossil-fuel engine for longer journeys on the road. But this does not appear to be happening.

A study carried out by the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) shows worrying data. The study notes that users of this type of vehicle forget to use the electric motor and rely more on the internal combustion engine for all their journeys.

This means that electric motor use is between 26% and 56% lower than expected. And if the electric motor is not used, fossil-fuel consumption increases, petrol or diesel, with a corresponding rise in polluting emissions. It is estimated that the real consumption of plug-in hybrid cars is between 42% and 67% above the figures announced by manufacturers.

As a result of this situation, there are calls for the controls and labelling of these vehicles to be reviewed. It should be remembered that in Spain, plug-in hybrid vehicles use the DGT 0 environmental label, provided they have an electric range of more than 40 kilometres.

Cars that use this plug-in hybrid technology benefit from tax incentives, so it is important to know their real behaviour in order to classify them correctly. Even in some countries, such as several US states, they will still be allowed to be sold despite the ban on selling combustion-engine cars from 2035, so the real impact of their use is in doubt.

In the United States, several solutions are being proposed to tackle this problem. One of them would be showing drivers how much money they save by using the electric motor instead of burning fuel. In this way, users could be made aware of the benefit of using more electricity and less fuel on their shorter journeys.

This could be a solution, but for the time being the problem remains, and it is something governments will have to study in order to effectively reduce polluting emissions in the short term.