The VW brand of the German group Volkswagen wants to stop selling cars with combustion engines in Europe between 2033 and 2035 to switch to electric vehicles, leaving more time in other markets, including China.
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Under the pressure of increasingly stringent anti-pollution standards, global automakers are setting their own combustion engine release schedules one after another.
For its part, the VW brand had already announced at the beginning of the year to reach by 2030 an electric share in its European sales of 70%.
The whole group has planned to invest 46 billion euros in five years in its electric shift.
“
We will make our entire fleet CO2 neutral by 2050 at the latest,
” VW sales director Klaus Zellmer said in an interview with the Bavarian daily Münchner Merkur published on Sunday.
“
In Europe, we will be leaving the combustion engine vehicle market between 2033 and 2035
”.
All electric for later in the United States and China
This release will take place “
a little later in the United States and China.
In South America and Africa, due to the lack of political framework conditions and infrastructure, it will take a little longer
, ”he added.
“
As a mass manufacturer, VW has to adapt to the different speeds of transformation in different regions.
Our competitors who sell vehicles mainly in Europe, for example, will certainly have to face a much less complex transformation (...)
”, explains Klaus Zellmer to explain this less ambitious schedule than other manufacturers.
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The high-end brand Audi, also a subsidiary of the Volkswagen group, announced last week that it wanted to stop producing vehicles equipped with combustion engines by 2033, with a possible exception in China.
On July 14, the European Union will unveil reinforced objectives for reducing CO2 emissions by 2030, as well as regulatory proposals, which will force many manufacturers to accelerate the reduction of their emissions and their transition to electricity.
