The electric car, an interesting windfall for the French economy.

According to a study by the consulting firm Accenture, the electric car will create an economic system level whose potential is estimated at 200 billion euros, just for France.

Even if the market share of electric cars is currently around 1% in France, the development of this sector is indisputable. Thus, over the first eight months of the year in France, sales increased sharply without however reaching 2% market share. And that’s just the beginning. With the upcoming releases of Renault Zoe , Peugeot e-208 or DS 3 Crossback E-Tense.

According to this study, the French car fleet should have a million electrified cars by 2025, but it will nevertheless be necessary to wait until 2040 for these to overtake conventional cars, in annual sales. This study also indicates that this increase will create new economic opportunities, particularly in the production and distribution of electricity, but also in infrastructure and associated services. 

For the first area, of course, the traditional players that are electricity producers are the most legitimate to take advantage of this windfall, but other players will be interested in it. Today, almost no service station offers charging infrastructure for electric cars.

And that’s not all since local authorities – like Paris, owner of the charging network inherited from Autolib could also play a role. We can also count on parking managers or even certain manufacturers of electric cars like Tesla, which could offer offers. The Accenture firm estimates that the infrastructure market, which goes from its deployment to its management, will represent 40 billion euros in turnover until 2,040.

The other part of this ecosystem is entitled “valuing flexibility”. This component is the most original and the most revolutionary since it represents the ability to modulate energy according to demand. 

Clearly, “it is a question of intelligently storing energy and delivering it according to market prices and needs, and thus replacing the centralized production means explained by Thierry Mileo, director at Accenture. This flexibility should make it possible to smooth the peaks in electricity production, thereby lowering production capacities.

Finally, the last part deals with additional services such as the financing of electric cars, batteries or other additional services inherent in business fleets, for example. New companies are concerned, but there is a good chance that historic brands like EDF, GDF Suez and other Enedis will be at the heart of this ecosystem. To succeed in this transformation, some of them have already anticipated and joined forces. EDF has just concluded an agreement with Nissan and Engie is working with Arval, one of the key players in the rental of vehicles for professionals.

Electric vehicles will therefore constitute an attractive economic windfall. It remains to be seen now if this succeeds in offsetting the negative effects of this transition and in particular the job losses linked to the manufacture of thermal vehicles.