Tina Bellon and Paul Lienert

(Reuters) – Global automakers plan to invest more than half a billion dollars in electric cars and batteries by 2030 according to a Reuters analysis. This is to increase investments aimed to wean car buyers from fossil fuels, and meet increasingly stringent decarbonization goals.

Three years ago, Reuters conducted a similar analysis and found that auto companies were planning to spend $300 billion on EVs. But looming zero-carbon mandates in cities such as London and Paris and countries from Norway to China have lent additional urgency to the industry’s EV-related investment commitments.

Recent analysis has shown that carmakers are planning to spend $515 billion to create and manufacture new electric vehicles, and to shift from the combustion engine. However, forecasters and industry leaders remain worried that EV consumers will not be able to meet their ambitious targets without significant additional incentives or increased spending on the grid.

Brian Maxim of AutoForecast Solutions is head for global powertrain forecasting. Maxim says that once a few companies had launched EV programs, all others needed to either announce them or risk being left behind.

He said, however, that this leaves vehicle manufacturers with significant volume plans for vehicle categories that have not been accepted by consumers and which will make little to no profit for many years.

Reuters gathered the information from investor presentations, company statements and regulatory filings.

Others have produced different projections of spending. AlixPartners in June predicted that by 2025, the industry’s investments in electric vehicles will reach $330 Billion. AlixPartners reports that all major automakers worldwide spent close to $225 billion each on research and development and capital expenditures in 2020.

Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:) Inc is the largest EV manufacturer in the world. It seems to sell almost every model it makes and has new “gigafactories”, worth multibillions of dollars, near Berlin and Austin, that will greatly increase its annual production. The company’s value was $1.2 trillion in early November. This is more than double the total of Volkswagen AG (OTC) and Tesla Inc. Toyota Motor (NYSE.) Corp. Ford Motor (NYSE.) Co. General Motors Co.

In the meantime, the political and regulatory pressure on world carmakers is increasing to force them into reducing production of fossil-fuel vehicles. This includes gasoline-electric hybrids. They also need to increase their output of full-electric models.

Numerous countries have stated that by 2030, new engine cars will be banned from sales, ranging in size from Sweden and Singapore. U.S. President Joseph Biden stated that he would like 40%- 50% of all sales to go to electric cars by 2030.

The Volkswagen Group of Germany, still reeling from 2016 Dieselgate emissions cheating scandals, is leading the charge in the industry with over $110 billion worth of EV and battery investments commitments until 2030. These commitments are more than 20% of total industry investment and underpin VW’s ambitious rollout plans to produce millions of EVs across North America, Europe, China, and Europe over the next decade.

According to the public data, VW’s investment, just like many others, aims at increasing the battery range, performance, and cost, and expanding battery production around the world.

VW and the other German automakers Daimler AG (DE) and BMW AG plan to invest a total of $185 billion by 2030. Meanwhile, GM and Ford USA expect to spend close to $60 billion between 2025 and 2025.

Chinese automakers led by VW Motor and GM’s local partner SAIC Motor have already announced over $100 billion worth of investment plans for the next 10 years. Japanese automakers lag behind. Honda Motor, Toyota Motor, and Nissan (OTC) Motor have all publicly committed less than $40 Billion.

These are not the investments of the many billions of dollars that the largest global battery companies have made in additional production capacities, often in collaboration with automaker partners.