(image: Korea Bizwire)
SEOUL, Jan. 20 (Korea Bizwire) — The number of registered vehicles in South Korea grew nearly 3 percent in 2020 from a year earlier, with that of green cars exceeding the 800,000 mark, government data showed Wednesday.
The total number of car registrations came to 24,365,979 units at the end of last year, up 2.9 percent from the previous year, according to the data from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport.
The number translates into one vehicle for every 2.13 people living in Asia’s fourth-largest economy.
Last year’s growth rate represents a turnaround from a recent downturn.
The number of registered vehicles expanded 4.3 percent on-year in 2015, with the annualized growth rate dropping to 3.9 percent in 2016, 3.3 percent in 2017, 3 percent in 2018 and 2 percent in 2019.
Registered eco-friendly vehicles, including hybrids, plug-in hybrids and pure electric cars, numbered more than 820,000 last year, accounting for 3.4 percent of all cars on the streets of South Korea. The portion was up from 2.5 percent a year earlier.
Of the green cars, those running on hydrogen fuel cells numbered 10,090, a 115 percent increase from the previous year, while hybrids rose 33 percent on-year to 674,461. The number of electric vehicles soared 50 percent to 134,962.
Locally manufactured cars took up 89 percent of the total registered vehicles, with imports making up the rest. The number of imported cars was up 0.8 percentage point from the prior year.
The data also showed some 3.87 million used cars changed hands last year, up 7.2 percent from a year earlier.
(Yonhap)
