Tesla, Nissan and BMW have helped to create a spark of interest in Electric Vehicles thanks to the Model S, i3 and Leaf according to recent sales trends.

According to industry analysts the EV market will continue to grow as buyers become familiar with the range of electric powered cars now entering the market.

Predictions indicate that EV sales may continue on an upward trend with as much as 150k units being sold too market by 2020.

For the year ending 2014 sales are expected to hit 53k, up from the previous year of 31k. The rise is being accounted for with the better understanding by consumers of battery technology and the range extending capabilities of EV’s. Although battery technology is still lagging.

Uptake of EV’s depend’s on a few factors, the charging infrastructure and incentives too switch from the traditional combustion engine era cars.

The Norwegian government recently introduced 11,500 euro tax break which saw a sharp rise in the sales of EV’s, Norway has the highest uptake of EV ownership within Europe with 6 percent accounting for new car sales.

The rest of Europe has been slower to respond, Germany and Spain have little to no government backed incentives while the UK and France are beginning to follow Norway’s formula, for example by introducing more charging points.

The EU tried to push through legislation to force member states to increase the amount of charging points but this bid was not ratified.

Nissan used to have the EV market too itself, but competition is slowly growing with the likes of Volkswagen offering the 34,000 euro e-Golf.

VW say they could produce many more EV’s but for VW there is simply not enough demand to justify the extra overheads.

In Europe the current EV leader in terms of sales is the Nissan Leaf with the Tesla Model S in 2nd and the BMW i3 in 3rd.