Electric Vehicles From China to Europe by Rail

EVs from China to Europe... by rail?

I haven't seen other-than-rail news outlets cover this yet so be vary, but here's what I dropped as an 'exclusive' with the Pro Report last week and now to you.

China Railway said this week that EVs can be shipped to Europe by rail from the 1st of October, opening a new cargo category for China-Europe rail freight. (link) This comes, apparently, after two years of 'intensive lobbying' from the industry, including carmakers like Geely. The "finished" EVs are allowed, whereas lithium battery shipments continue to be not.

The shipping by rail should mean a 6,000-mile journey of anything between 13...20 days from what I've gathered. By ship is said to take from 20...28 days, which is also confirmed by the time it takes a Tesla ship to travel from Shanghai to Slovenia. (link) If you have better info on the durations on each, share at will.

Of course, this doesn't immediately mean we'll see EVs flowing in considering there's a... terrorist nation called Russia somewhere in between.

A boost for EVs

I consider it another tailwind for the Chinese EV makers that are just about to flood the European market anyway — BYD, XPeng, NIO, and Polestar among others. It's likely that Tesla will also benefit from this alternative logistics channel until Giga Berlin has ramped up its production enough to supply the market itself.

At any rate, this will surely expand our little EV Universe, even if it just eases operations.

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