Exploring Electric Car Adoption Intent: Role of Current Travel Characteristics Among Daily Car Users

Abstract

Electric vehicles (EVs) have garnered significant attention in the context of sustainable transportation. Despite this growing interest, the adoption of electric cars in Indonesia, particularly in Medan city, remains at an early stage. Medan is a worthwhile case study of a fast-growing city in a developing country. Several existing literatures have taken Indonesia uniquely into context and emerged as a foundation framework. However, there still remains little comprehension regarding the perceptions and intentions of conventional car users. To address the gap in research, this study focuses on the intention of car drivers in Medan to adopt electric cars through conversion rather than addition. By examining the factors influencing this adoption intention, we contribute early insights into the context of a developing city (Medan) in developing countries. Our structured questionnaire collected responses from 390 car drivers in Medan Selayang Sub-district. We employ an ordinal logistic regression (OLR) to model the impact of explanatory variables, including socioeconomic background, attitudinal perception, and specific travel characteristics, on the adoption intention. An OLR model was used since our dependent variable (adoption intention) is in ordinal form. Our findings reveal significant links between socioeconomic and attitudinal variables and adoption intention. Notably, variables such as car ownership, daily driving range, and monthly maintenance expenses of conventional cars owned by respondents positively influence the likelihood of adopting electric cars in the future. The result indicates middle-to-high income people as the potential electric car market in this context. We further discuss how the maturity of widespread information regarding electric cars might influence the perception of current conventional car users. These findings hold implications for the design of targeted interventions to promote electric car adoption in Medan city and similar contexts.

Keywords

• travel characteristics
• electric car conversion
• adoption intention
• car drivers