(Electric) Mobility During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Continental Mobility Study 2020
Since 2011, the technology company Continental has carried out the Continental Mobility Study on various key topics at regular intervals. The Continental Mobility Study 2020 is the sixth edition of the study, which asks people in Germany, France, the US, China and Japan about various aspects of mobility. One of the focus areas of the current study is electric mobility.
The 2020 survey took place in two stages with different emphases. In the first stage in September 2020, a representative sample of the population was surveyed in five countries on three continents: Germany, France, the US, Japan and China.
In addition to the expectations and attitudes regarding electric vehicles, the survey also dealt with changes in mobility against the backdrop of the global COVID-19 pandemic. Measures to stop the spread of the virus temporarily reduced mobility to a great extent in all of the surveyed countries as part of strict lockdowns imposed on their populations. At the same time, the behavior of many people changed, even after the measures were relaxed and mobility could largely return to normal. The findings of the survey reveal specific changes in behavior, attitudes and expectations.
In the following, the key results of the first wave of the Continental Mobility Study 2020 are summarized.
44 % of Americans can imagine buying an electric car.
Electric mobility was already a key focus of the Mobility Study in 2011. In 2013, the study also covered attitudes toward this topic. Almost a decade on, the time has come once again to focus on the topic of alternative drive systems – especially battery-powered vehicles. There are several reasons for this.
On the one hand, the spread of electrically powered vehicles lags significantly behind the expectations expressed in recent years.
On the other, the topic of ecological sustainability has definitively found acceptance in the social and political mainstream. For many companies, it has gone from being an optional luxury to a central pillar of their business model.
This raises the question of how people in leading industrialized countries on three continents view the topic of electric mobility today.
Download the brochure "(Electric) Mobility During the COVID-19 Pandemic" - pdf (633KB) as part of the Mobility Study 2020.