Research on a Boomerang Aerodynamic Ellipse Optimization Algorithm–Informer–Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average-Based Forecasting Model for New Energy Vehicle Sales in China

To improve the accuracy and stability of new energy vehicle (NEV) sales forecasting in China, this study develops a hybrid forecasting framework integrating the Informer model, autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA), and the Boomerang Aerodynamic Ellipse Optimization (BAEO) algorithm. Monthly data from January 2016 to December 2023 covering 31 provincial-level administrative regions in China (excluding Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan) were collected from authoritative statistical sources. A multidimensional feature system was established by incorporating factors related to charging infrastructure, transportation demand, market development, and environmental conditions. Data preprocessing techniques, including Min–Max normalization, lagged variables, rolling statistical features, and seasonal sine–cosine encoding, were applied to capture temporal dependencies and periodic patterns. The BAEO algorithm was employed to optimize the key hyperparameters of the Informer model, while the ARIMA model was introduced to correct linear patterns in forecasting residuals. The proposed BAEO–Informer–ARIMA framework was evaluated against seasonal autoregressive integrated moving average (SARIMA), Prophet, extreme gradient boosting (XGBoost), long short-term memory (LSTM), gated recurrent unit (GRU), Transformer, and Informer models under the same chronological evaluation strategy. Results show that the proposed framework achieved superior forecasting performance, with a coefficient of determination (R2) of 0.9544, mean absolute error (MAE) of 24,068, root mean square error (RMSE) of 26,822, and mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) of 3.39%. Furthermore, uncertainty analysis based on rolling-validation forecast errors was conducted to establish a 90% confidence interval for future projections. Forecast results for 2024–2030 reveal sustained NEV sales growth with gradually decreasing growth rates and persistent seasonal variations. This study provides quantitative insights for NEV market planning, charging infrastructure deployment, and low-carbon policy formulation.