VW ends production of electric e-Golf in favor of new ID.3

VW confirmed that the production of electric e-Golf ends today at the Transparent Factory in Dresden. It will be replaced by the new ID.3 electric car.

The VW e-Golf was, by most people’s description, a compliance electric car.

It was built on an existing fossil-fuel-powered model, produced in limited quantities, and made available mostly in places to comply with regulations.

However, it was a fairly successful compliance electric car with some updates for the model year 2017 that extended the range.

Between the production in Wolfsburg, which started in 2014 and ended last summer, and the production in Dresden, which started in 2017 and is ending today, VW has produced 145,561 e-Golf electric cars.

But now the end of the e-Golf is making room for the new ID.3, and VW plans to produce more ID.3s by the end of the next year than the number of e-Golfs produced over the six years of the program.

Danny Auerswald, head of plant of the Transparent Factory in Dresden, commented on the shift to the ID.3:

The end of the e-Golf is also the start of the final preparations for the ID.3. In just a few weeks, we will be opening the next chapter for the Transparent Factory. After Zwickau, we are the second location in Europe to manufacture vehicles based on the new modular e-drive system. Volkswagen is thus underlining the importance of the Saxon plants in the groupwide E-offensive.

Volkswagen is planning to start production of the ID.3 in Dresden as soon as next month — a quick turnaround after ending production of the e-Golf.

Thomas Aehlig, chairman of the Works Council of the Transparent Factory, added:

The start of assembly of the ID.3 is very good news for the workforce and the reward for the many efforts made in the transformation of the site since 2016. We have thus achieved sustainable job security for the core workforce and a positive future perspective for the site.

VW already delivered around 30,000 ID.3 electric cars and plans to ramp up production to satisfy the demand, which could be significant once the cheaper version of the vehicle is made available next year.