Provisional sales data from the European Environment Agency show that in 2013 nearly 50,000 plug-in vehicles were sold, representing around 0.4% of all car sales in the EU.

The top-three selling EV models in 2013 were all new entrants to the market (Renault ZOE, Mitsubishi Outlander and Volvo V60 Plug-in). In contrast, sales of the best-selling Opel Ampera and Peugeot Citroen iOn / C-ZERO models in 2012 fell significantly.

The rise in EV sales come as the EU’s first obligatory rules on carbon emissions require car manufacturers to limit their average car to a maximum of 130 grams of CO2 per km by 2015, and 95g by 2021 after the German government managed to push the deadline back a year.

As well as giving a one-year delay, the revised agreement offers more flexibility to carmakers in terms of when they can use additional allowances for selling electric cars, known as “supercredits”.

Commenting on the figures, Greg Archer of Transport & Environment said: ‘Electric vehicles can play an important role in the shift to more sustainable mobility, and their increasing sales are being driven by carmakers’ need to innovate to meet EU CO2 regulations.’

The figures are revealed in the electrification section of T&E’s 2014 cars and CO2 report, which shows sales of electric cars in Europe represent around a quarter of global sales. Sales in California are the highest in the world driven by a mandatory but tradeable requirement on carmakers to supply small numbers of these vehicles.

In response T&E advocate a similar policy for the EU rather than encouraging EV sales through the system of “supercredits”, which it says reduce the need for carmakers to improve the efficiency of conventional vehicles.

Last month T&E revealed that most European carmakers on track to hit 2021 CO2 targets.

The report shows that five out of seven European carmakers are on track to meet their CO2 targets by the 2021 deadline if they keep progressing as they have since the introduction of the law in 2008. Volvo, Toyota, Peugeot-Citroen, Renault, Ford and Daimler will all hit their targets early while VW and Nissan are on schedule.

On the other hand, if they don’t accelerate their current rate of CO2 reduction Fiat would miss their target by one year (2022) and BMW by three years (2024).