EU announces deal to cut emissions from new cars by 37.5%, giving a boost to electric cars

The EU made official its deal to cut CO2 emissions from new cars by 37.5% by 2030, which should force automakers to sell more electric vehicles in Europe.

While the goal is aggressive and unprecedented for such a large market like Europe, it’s actually a compromise over a compromise.

As we reported earlier this year, the European Parliament was pushing for its own target of 40% by 2030, but Germany, where a large part of the European auto industry is located, lobbied for no more than 30% reduction in emissions from new cars.

The European Council was pushing for a 35% reduction in CO2 emissions from new cars by 2030.

It resulted in a compromise of 37.5%

Miguel Arias Cañete, the EU climate change and energy commissioner, made the deal official this week:

Another deal!! This time on #CO2cars. We reached a compromise to cut emissions from cars (by 37.5%) and vans (by 31%) by 2030. With these ambitious targets, Europe is once again showing how to turn the #ParisAgremeent and #COP24 into action. pic.twitter.com/26HNfcHQiY

— Miguel Arias Cañete (@MAC_europa) December 17, 2018

The emission restrictions will apply to the overall sales of automakers – resulting in them having to sell more electric vehicles and low-emission vehicles in order to compensate for their gas- and diesel-powered cars.

Automakers are not happy about it.

The German Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA), which represents companies like BMW, Daimler, and Volkswagen, said in a statement about the deal (via DW):

“The regulation demands too much while promoting too little. Nobody knows today how the agreed limits can be achieved in the time given,”

That’s even though all of those automakers claims to be making significant investments into electric vehicles.

Electrek’s Take

As I have stated on several occasions, I think electric vehicle adoption will happen even faster.

I think there will be so many great new all-electric vehicle options on the market over the next 5 years, that no one will want to buy a non-electric vehicle at some point between 2020 and 2025.

Nonetheless, goals enforced by regulators like this one are useful to accelerate the investment schedule of some automakers who are not in a hurry to invest in electric vehicle programs.