For car companies with major electrical ambitions, 2021 will be a make or break year.
More than a dozen new models of electric vehicles will hit US showrooms this year, while Silicon Valley-inspired startups and established auto makers like General Motors Co. and Volkswagen AG show drivers the results of billions in spending on the technology.
For consumers, that means more plug-in options on the new car than ever before. But whether carmakers can convince buyers to ditch fossil fuels for good is still uncertain.
There are still many challenges for electric vehicles: not enough places to charge, limited driving range and sticker prices that are still higher than comparable journeys with conventional gasoline engines. An existing federal tax credit worth $ 7,500 is intended to bridge the price gap, and industry representatives have said they hope to extend the benefit through new legislation.
An influx of new electric car models helped boost sales of battery-powered vehicles in Europe and China last year. But in the US, where buyers had fewer choices and fewer government-backed incentives, electric car sales fell about 10% in 2020, industry analysts say.