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Clean energy and transportation investment in the United States continued its record-setting growth in Q1 of 2024, reaching a new high of $71 billion. This continues a sustained quarter-on-quarter growth trend that began in Q1 2021, with a 40% increase in Q1 of 2024 from the same period in 2023. Clean investment accounted for 5.1% of total US private investment in structures, equipment, and durable consumer goods in the United States, compared to 3.7% in Q1 2023.
Investment in manufacturing clean energy and transportation technology continued to be the main driver of clean investment and growth and increased 28% quarter-on-quarter, again led by the electric vehicle supply chain. Investment in deploying technology to decarbonize energy and industrial production slipped 3% quarter-on-quarter but is still up 51% compared to the same period last year. And investment in the deployment of emerging climate technologies (ECT)—clean hydrogen, carbon management, and sustainable aviation fuels—continued to surge, with a 37% increase relative to Q4 2023 and a five-fold increase relative to Q1 2023. Indeed, actual investment in each individual ECT technology surpassed wind investment this quarter, reflecting continued momentum.
Retail investment declined 3% relative to the previous quarter but increased 12% compared to Q1 2023. The quarterly decline in retail investment was due primarily to a slowdown in zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) sales in Q1. New ZEV registrations (a proxy for sales) declined by 9% in Q1 2024 relative to the previous quarter (though still up 14% compared to Q1 2023). The weakness came entirely from battery electric vehicles (BEV). Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV) continued to post strong registration growth. For BEVs, a decline in Tesla Model 3 registrations accounted for nearly two-thirds of the overall drop, though registrations of BEVs made by the Big 3 U.S. automakers (GM, Ford, and Stellantis), European, and Japanese automakers also declined. In contrast, registrations of BEVs produced by Korean automakers continued to post impressive growth. A contributing factor to the weakness in ZEV registrations in Q1 was a slowdown in overall vehicle sales growth in the US.
