Sweden

Major Developments in 2020

In 2020, Sweden surpassed a 30 % market share of new-car sales, which is the highest market share in the EU, and currently hosts the largest electric bus fleet in the Nordics. Over 3 % of the passenger vehicle fleet, as well as the bus fleet, in Sweden, are plug-in electric vehicles. In 2018, Sweden adopted an ambitious climate law that stipulates net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2045. The law requires all policy areas, not only the environment, climate, transport, and energy, to contribute to achieving the target. The transport sector has an intermediate target to reduce its GHG emissions by 70% by 2030, compared to 2010. Electrification, biofuels, and a more transport-efficient society have been pointed out as key enablers to reach these goals.

In 2020, the Swedish Government launched two major initiatives in order to accelerate the electrification of the transport sector. First of all, the Electrification Strategy was launched that will contribute to a fast, smart and economically efficient electrification and comprises all user sectors, not just transport. The second initiative was The Government’s Electrification Commission, which specifically aims to accelerate the electrification of the transport sector and comprises government and representatives of business, academia, local, and regional public authorities.

The Electric bus purchase rebate was redesigned in 2020 into a Climate rebate, which includes both other types of heavy-duty vehicles, such as trucks and electric working machines, as well as renewable fuels in addition to electricity and hydrogen. In 2020, the government decided to allocate 50 million EUR for 2021 and 55 million EUR for 2022 for regional electrification pilots of heavy-duty trucks with a focus on plug-in and fuel-cell electric trucks. The development of electric road systems (ERS) is also on-going, with the goal to deploy 2,000 kilometres of ERS on public roads by 2030.

New policies, legislation, incentives, funding, research, and taxation

In 2020, the government reinforced Sweden’s major transport research and innovation partnership programme, The Strategic vehicle research and innovation programme (FFI), with 10 million EUR between 2021 and 2022 to support the research and development of work machines in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and strengthen the Swedish automotive industry's competitiveness.

Since 2015, there has been a national investment-support scheme for the deployment of charging infrastructure in Sweden, with grants up to 50 % of the investment cost. This has advanced the deployment of charging infrastructure, which by the end of 2020 comprised about 11,500 public charging points. The government therefore appointed 15 million EUR for 2020-2022 to complete a nation-wide fast-charging infrastructure deployment and the first call opened in the autumn of 2020.

In 2020, the government decided to merge the current home-charging support scheme, the PV solar support scheme and the stationary energy storage support scheme into a “green deduction” in the existing tax reduction scheme ROT (Repairs, conversion, extensions), which will enter into force by 2021.

Outlook

The development regarding the market share for plug-in electric passenger cars, city buses, and distribution trucks looks very positive in Sweden. One major driver for this development is the EU CO2 reduction requirements for new vehicles and where the Swedish policy framework has accomplished a high allocation compared to other EU markets. The future developments in Sweden depend on Swedish policy frameworks as well as other EU countries, which could influence the allocations of vehicles to Sweden. Major efforts are now being made to enable public fast charging for heavy vehicles. Continuous charging, so-called electric roads systems, are being explored more widely on public roads.

Swedish stakeholders participate in the two ICPEI (Important Projects of Common European Interest) projects on batteries. Ensuring the upscaling of a sustainable battery value chain is increasingly important.