What do we see?
The number of new passenger cars registered per year increased steadily between 2014 and 2019, growing between 2 and 6% per year. From 2020, we see a sharp decline, perhaps due to the COVID crisis. The figure fell a little further in the following two years. The latest available figure from 2022 shows a 30% drop compared with peak year 2019. The number of used passenger cars registered per year has continued to hover around 350,000 over the years. Again, 2019 was a peak year with 382,934 registrations. The decline in subsequent years was only 10%. As a result, the share of used passenger car registrations in recent years is around 60% of the total, compared to around 55% a decade ago.
What’s the aim?
In a circular economy, we want products to be used for as long and as high-quality as possible. For passenger cars, many factors come into play when deciding which evolutions are desirable in a circular economy. On the one hand, cars should ideally be used for as long as their technical lifespan and environmental performance allow. The second-hand car market then ensures that cars are reused. On the other hand, new cars offer potential for new technologies to penetrate the car fleet. Both the composition of new cars and the material stories behind the technologies need to be considered for a circular assessment. Finally, the use phase is even more crucial than the production phase: in this sense, we should above all strive for the most intensive and efficient use of passenger cars in circulation.
What does this indicator measure?
This indicator shows the number of newly registered vehicles per year, distinguishing between new and second-hand cars. The data for this indicator come from Ecoscore, which is managed by VITO. The basic data come from the FPS Mobility and Transport.
