A machine learning approach to analyse and predict the electric cars scenario: The Italian case

Abstract

The automotive market is experiencing, in recent years, a period of deep transformation. Increasingly stricter rules on pollutant emissions and greater awareness of air quality by consumers are pushing the transport sector towards sustainable mobility. In this historical context, electric cars have been considered the most valid alternative to traditional internal combustion engine cars, thanks to their low polluting potential, with high growth prospects in the coming years. This growth is an important element for companies operating in the electricity sector, since the spread of electric cars is necessarily accompanied by an increasing need of electric charging points, which may impact the electricity distribution network. In this work we proposed a novel application of machine learning methods for the estimation of factors which could impact the distribution of the circulating fleet of electric cars in Italy. We first collected a new dataset from public repository to evaluate the most relevant features impacting the electric cars market. The collected datasets are completely new, and were collected starting from the identification of the main variables that were potentially responsible for the spread of electric cars. Subsequently we distributed a novel designed survey to further investigate such factors on a population sample. Using machine learning models, we could disentangle potentially new interesting information concerning the Italian scenario. We analysed it, in fact, according to different geographical Italian dimensions (national, regional and provincial) and with the final identification of those potential factors that could play a fundamental role in the success and distribution of electric cars mobility. Code and data are available at: https://github.com/GiovannaMariaDimitri/A-machine-learning-approach-to-analyse-and-predict-the-electric-cars-scenario-the-Italian-case.