![]() ![]() He has said if only the relatively rich can afford personal mobility this will not play well at election time. Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares has already pointed to the problems facing Europe if the forced adoption of electric vehicles means average earners are priced out of new cars. The economic value will fall significantly, and employment too, and this is likely to provoke political instability,” Molden said. It faces a shrinking industry with Europe becoming a final assembly factory for the Chinese, a bit like what happened to the U.K. It doesn’t have the raw materials or processing capacity, so it can’t compete. I don’t think (the politicians) know what to do. “Europe is stuck between China and America it’s caught in a pincer. So, if you convert everything to hybrids, that’s not much more expensive than making current ICE vehicles and saves significant CO2,” Molden said. A BEV is zero emissions at the tailpipe, but during construction, battery materials and the like, that’s say 7 tons for a 80-kWh battery and 200,000 kilometers (125,000 miles) that’s about 35 g/km, then electricity generation 58 g/km, that’s 93 g/km. If you did nothing but convert all of them to full hybrids you could reduce this by 30% - that’s 140 g/km, worth having but nowhere near zero. “The average CO2 of new ICE cars is about 160 grammes per kilometer (g/km), plus 40 g/km for gasoline production – a total of around 200 g/km. If the rate of Chinese intrusion into Europe was setting off panic in the European auto industry there could still be a climb down by not banning ICE completely there could be some wiggle room,” Molden said. “If it looked by, say, 2028 that BEV adoption was way off course, if battery material prices were not much lower and infrastructure was insufficient, a graceful backdown might be needed. Molden, in an interview, said there is still time for the EU to avert disaster by amending the rules and allowing hybrids to take the strain for now in the march towards cutting CO2 emissions. Nick Molden, CEO of independent emissions testing company Emissions Analytics, agrees with Toyota that many big auto manufacturers are hedging their bets more than their public statements would suggest in favor of hybrids. Critics say this is a cynical move to justify its mistake in not fully embracing the electric revolution. ![]() Toyota has been comparatively slow to make the switch to BEVs, saying this reflected the reality of the market. Just before Christmas, Toyota Motor Corp President Akio Toyoda said the auto industry’s silent majority questioned the whole future of electric vehicles and was hiding a growing uneasiness about the electric transition. Images/LightRocket via Getty Images) SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images The Wall Street Journal’s Allysia Finley points out that winter weather not only slashes electric car range, it slows down the process of recharging to a trickle.Ĭalifornia Air Resources Board (CARB) log (Photo Illustration by Rafael Henrique/SOPA. That won’t change much in the foreseeable future, the newspaper says, after the Russian invasion of Ukraine caused a European energy crisis. According to the Wall Street Journal in Germany, the cost of fuelling a BEV has risen to close or even higher than an ICE vehicle on public charging networks. If sales are going to rise about 7 times in Western Europe by 2030, that’s a formidable barrier to cost cutters as demand for expensive and rare content explodes. That has now been reversed because of the cost of exotic raw materials like lithium, nickel, cobalt, copper, magnesium and graphite. The price of batteries, which VW now say account for around 40% of the BEV price, must fall continuously. The path to 100% BEVs in Europe’s new car market depends on the underlying economics. ![]() A couple of stories in the Wall Street Journal over the holidays, and an earlier report from Toyota, point to some gathering obstacles that might cause an EU re-think. So by 2035 in Europe, no new ICE power in any form will be allowed unless the EU relents. This is because a total switch to BEVs would harm the poor in remote, rural areas, the CARB says. The California Air Resources Board (CARB), known for its radical approach to CO2 regulation, has decreed some PHEVs will be allowed after its proposed ban on new ICE car sales in 2035. Plug-in hybrids (PHEVs-bigger battery than regular hybrid allows up to 50 miles battery-electric only range) will be banned too, perhaps demonstrating not only EU legislators are unaware of unintended consequences but also haven’t heard the aphorism “perfection can be the enemy of the good”. Unless circumstances force the EU to dilute its rules, this type of hybrid (battery working with ICE engine, little electric-only range, like the original Toyota Prius) will be banned by 2035.
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