The Netherlands has one of the oldest vehicle fleets in Europe: more than 5 million cars are older than 10 years

The Netherlands now has a total of 343,677 electric passenger cars and light commercial vehicles. That is about 3.1 percent of all vehicles. This number still seems modest. Nevertheless, electric driving is on the rise,” says the RDW. The majority of cars in the Netherlands still run on petrol or diesel: 71 percent and 18 percent respectively. The number of petrol cars currently exceeds 7.8 million. Although diesels have become less popular in recent years, almost 2 million are still driving around in our country.

More than 5 million passenger cars and 400,000 commercial vehicles are more than 10 years old, which means that the Netherlands has a relatively old fleet. There are 2976 electric passenger cars and 403 electric commercial vehicles in this category. “That is nothing compared to the numbers of combustion engines in that age group that are still in use,” said the RDW.

It is in ‘a stark contrast’ to vehicles younger than 5 years old, the body says: 12 percent of passenger cars in this age category are electric, compared to 0.1 percent of cars older than 10 years. The same trend can be seen in company cars: the share of electric among young company cars is five times greater than among older ones. However, the most popular type of commercial vehicles is still the diesel engine: 88.5 percent of light commercial vehicles run on diesel.

The RDW also announced that Flevoland has the most fully electrically powered cars, with a share of 11.5 percent. In Flevoland, 20.9 percent of passenger cars less than five years old are electric. According to the RDW, Limburg is well behind with 7.3 percent.

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