Claims frequency for collision-damaged battery electric vehicles (BEVs) rose year-over-year in the U.S., while claims severity for BEVs decreased during the same timeframe, according to Mitchell’s Q3 2024 “Plugged In: EV Collision Insights” report, released Nov. 13.
The report showed claims frequency for BEVs rose to 3.01% in the U.S., an increase of 47% over Q3 2023.
However, claims severity for repairable vehicles in the U.S. fell across the board: BEVs, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs), mild hybrid electric vehicles (MHEV) and internal combustion engine (ICE) cars all notched a lower claims severity in the U.S. than Q3 2023, reporting year-over-year decreases in repair costs ranging from 2% to 14% for these various types of vehicles.
BEVs logged the highest average repair costs at $5,560 per car in Q3, followed by PHEVs at $5,229 per car, ICE vehicles at $4,741 per car, and MHEVs at $4,426 per car.
BEVs also took longer to repair than their counterparts through the first three quarters of 2024. The U.S. year-to-date average keys-to-keys cycle time for BEV collision repairs was 19.5 days, a full three days and 18% more than ICE cars, according to the report.
Prices are equalizing between BEVs and ICE vehicles, creating more similarity in total loss outcomes. The average total loss market value for BEVs in Q3 2024 was $32,718 in the U.S., only $1,648 more than for ICE vehicles. Further, total loss frequency hit a rate of 9.9% for BEVs and 9.98% for ICE vehicles.
Front-end crash avoidance technologies and potentially faster-than-expected deceleration in BEVs contributed to a higher rate of rear-end impact for those cars compared to ICE vehicles, which more frequently sustained front-end damage. Nearly 36% of BEV repairs were classified as back-end impacts in Q3, versus just over 27.5% for ICE vehicles. But more than 31.5% of ICE automobiles had a front-end point of impact, compared to just 26% for BEVs.
BEVs also significantly outpaced ICE vehicles in terms of OEM parts usage, logging 90.3% compared to only 64.4% for ICE vehicles.
California had a greater repairable collision claims frequency for BEVs than any other state, hitting 5.86% in Q3, a nearly 0.7% increase from the Q2 2024.
Mitchell also reported that while overall hybrid sales appear to be steadily rising, “headwinds” appear to be boding against widespread PHEV adoption. The report cited an August 2024 J.D. Power study that stated PHEVs score much lower than BEVs in nine of 10 EV categories, particularly for battery range and total ownership cost.
That same study cited consumer concern with public charging infrastructure as another “persistent headwind” on EV sales.
Changing EV Policy
The Mitchell report comes at a time when federal EV policy is expected to shift under the coming Trump administration.
A federal public-private entity on Nov. 13 expressed a continuing intent to strongly advocate for widening EV adoption even amid expected changes to EV approaches under the next administration.
The federal Joint Office of Energy and Transportation established the Electric Vehicle Working Group in June 2022, to make recommendations to the secretaries of energy and transportation regarding the development and adoption of EVs into the U.S. transportation and energy systems.
“Obviously, there was an election last week, and changes in administration may bring changes in priorities, a natural part of our democratic process,” Joint Office of Energy and Transportation Executive Director Gabe Klein said during the working group meeting. “The Joint Office, however, will continue to address these priorities across the departments of Energy and Transportation.”
The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021 formed the working group.
“The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law is not just a name only,” Klein said. “It's a fundamentally bipartisan effort that's delivering billions of dollars in investment and good-paying jobs in states and communities across the country, regardless of political affiliation….In times of change like this, it's the private sector's dedication and consistency that can help provide stability going forward.”
EV Recommendations Adopted
The working group passed at least two recommendations related to light-duty EVs -- one related to a public education and awareness campaign and one related to managed charging.
Pursuant to the former recommendation, the working group will launch a program to promote the “ease and awareness of EV charging,” targeting the general public, rental car customers and car dealerships.
Two good reference points to inform the campaign may include the federal “Click It or Ticket” and Airbag and Seat Belt Safety campaigns, where the private sector joined the federal government to promote seat belt use and recognize the benefits of seat belt and airbag technology, Alliance for Automotive Innovation President and CEO John Bozzella said during the meeting.
“How far does a car go on a charge if it's an EV, and how and where and when do I charge it?” are a few common concerns that customers share regarding EVs, Bozzella said.
To stimulate charging efficiency, the working group is also considering a recommendation to create a national “EV Charging Station Competition to the Top” program, aimed at incentivizing charging stations to follow consumer-facing minimum National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure standards. The program may be structured similarly to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) ENERGY STAR rating framework, according to the recommendation.
The ENERGY STAR score rates performance on a percentile basis, and is expressed as a number on a 1-100 scale. For example, buildings with a score of 50 perform better than 50% of their peers.
Charging efficiency would not be structured in a cut-and-dry format that says “’this is a failure and this is a success,’” Bozzella said. Rather, “there’s ‘good, better, best.’ There's three, four, five stars.”
The working group did not hold a vote to adopt that recommendation, but members of the working group plan to soon retool the recommendation to include either a generic description of the entity that will rate charging infrastructure or the name of the entity itself.
The working group will next meet Nov. 20.
During the Nov. 13 meeting, the working group also voted to encourage large-scale “managed charging,” which refers to the optimization of EV charging for cost and electric grid benefits. Managed charging can either be scheduled by consumers to charge during the most cost-effective times to use electricity, or it can be done through an electric utility that is permitted direct control to a customer’s EV load to reduce grid stress and/or charge when renewables are abundant.
The working group identified two major challenges associated with managed charging that need to be addressed: lack of signals indicating grid conditions and the need for “flexibility” from EVs; and uncertainty of “dependable response” from EV or EV equipment providers to shift load.
“Successful [managed charging] lower volume demonstrations have occurred; now there is a need to align and scale,” the recommendation said. “Scaling requires standard communications among utilities, auto OEMs, EV equipment, software and service providers (collectively, EV Equipment Providers), as applicable, to receive and use data to adjust consumer charging.”
Brian Bradley