“The European car industry could be forced to pay up to 15,000 million euros in fines or abandon the production of more than 2.5 million cars” in order to meet EU emissions standards by 2025. So alarmist was shown the association of European manufacturers at the end of the summer in the mouth of its president, the CEO of Renault, Luca de Meo.
The figures used by manufacturers such as Renault have served for several months to request the suspension of these fines. Stellantis, despite not wanting to change the standard, is another manufacturer that assures that the emissions average will not be met. The threat from these manufacturers has already convinced the French Government to try to form a coalition of European countries to ask the Commission to lift the sanctions. But are these figures reliable? More and more people doubt it.
Most car brands could escape EU fines
The majority of manufacturers warn that they will not be able to meet the emissions average, consequently exposing themselves to fines amounting to tens of millions of euros. To achieve this, in the current state of their ranges, the brands they must sell practically one electric car (or PHEV) for every four gasoline carsdiesel or hybrid.
He Volkswagen Group will not achieve it and asks that the standard be adapted to the reality of the market, while the Stellantis group is even considering the possibility of stopping manufacturing hybrid and gasoline cars or raise your price to achieve balance in your average.
All this pessimism is based on an extrapolation of current sales of electric vehicles (commercial vehicles and passenger cars), projected until 2025, to obtain a hypothetical amount of sanctions.
From January to September, the electric car market share was from 13,1%when in the same period of 2023, the market share was 14.1%. It is true, electric sales are not very buoyant, but that does not mean that this trend has to be maintained over time or get worse.
Although some brands are safe because today they are already meeting the 2025 objectives, this is the case of BMW and of Volvoaccording to the UBS bank analyststhanks to their high sales of PHEV and electric models, most will not run the risk of paying fines. And the objective of -15% CO₂ emissions Regarding 2024, which must be reached next year, it was set in 2018. Car manufacturers have prepared for this by adapting their product plans based on this deadline.
The range of the vast majority of brands in the Stellantis group, for example, is made up of models with low displacement and power, and therefore low emissions. Except for Maserati, Jeep and Alfa Romeo, models with more than 130 HP are plug-in hybrids. The same happens with Renault, where the most powerful models are very low consumption hybrids, such as the Renault Clio E-Tech, the Austral-e or the Renault Espace, or directly electric.
In addition, most manufacturers have concentrated the arrival of new electric models for the last months of 2024 and the first months of 2025, in order to attract customers thanks to the freshness of their range, especially with the arrival of affordable models that They cost less than 30,000 euros, like the Renault 5, the Citroën ëC3 or the Kia EV3.
To determine the magnitude of the effort required of each manufacturer, the ‘Institut Mobilités en Transition’, an independent reflection group attached to the IDDRI, has carried out several simulations based on the hypothesis that they will sell as many cars in 2025 (combining all engines) as in 2024.
It seems that, “a Volkswagen Group exceptionwhich will undoubtedly have to ally with other brands, no other manufacturer is really at risk of paying a fine in 2025”, asegura Jean-Philippe HermineGeneral Director of the think tank.
Some of the brands that could be fined for not meeting the emissions average always have the possibility of joining the brands that sell the most electric cars, such as Tesla, or that have the most margin until reaching the emissions limit, such as Volvo .
This is, for example, what Mazda, Suzuki and Subaru did in previous years when they associated with Toyota; it is not in vain that the Japanese giant is a shareholder of these. However, it is unlikely that there is a brand that can absorb the Volkswagen Group’s excess emissions.
Source: www.motorpasion.com
