Comment on Europe’s battery problems show the governments need to up their game
MrMakabar@slrpnk.net 4 months ago
Sorry, but the fact of the matter is that the EU has a ban on fossil fuel cars starting 2035. The EU parliament is very likely going to have a coalition of EPP, Renew and S&D with maybe some support of the Greens or some groups from ECR. S&D and Renew are mostly pro ban. France just voted in a more left leaning parliament as well. So the Council is very likely to remain pro ban and it takes a qualified majority to change that law. There is basically no way to get the ban removed before the car manufacturers have to make the big investments into new EV factories.
This is CEOs preferring short term profits to make themself richer, while destroying the future of their companies.
sonori@beehaw.org 4 months ago
From my understanding the ban is only on solely combustion powered vehicles, plug in hybrid and methane steam reformation created hydrogen will still be allowed and expected, so it’s not really a ban on fossil fuel cars, but rather just on the inherently carbon producing ones.
poVoq@slrpnk.net 4 months ago
Yes, Germany pushed though an “synthetic fuel” exception, but that will be a niche product compared to electric cars.
The main “problem” is that European car manufacturers think small and efficient EVs are not profitable enough, thus they are neglecting that market or even cancelling their existing offers. This of course has a lot of knock-down effects, and with foreign luxury brands also being slowly pushed out of the Chinese market, there is really not much left these European companies can do to keep up their high profit margins (which directly relate to C-suite compensation, hence the big focus on that at the top).
MrMakabar@slrpnk.net 4 months ago
It has to be zero emissions “synthetic fuel” though. So if you use methane it has to be biogas and not natural gas.
MrMakabar@slrpnk.net 4 months ago
The rule is zero emissions for new cars sold in the EU starting 2035. So plug in hybrids are allowed as long as they only use e-fuels. Methane steam reformed hydrogen would also be allowed, as long as the methane does not come from fossil fuels.