France Plans to End Sales of Gas and Diesel Cars by 2040
The Fresh York Times
July 6, 2017
France is joining a growing movement to force the extinction of vehicles that run on fossil fuels, telling on Thursday that it would aim to end the sale of gasoline and diesel cars by 2040.
The target is less ambitious than ones set by countries like Norway and India. Still, coming from a major car-producing country, France’s declaration gave extra momentum to efforts to fight climate switch and urban smog by promoting the use of electrical cars.
The timing of the announcement was also significant, a day after the automaker Volvo said it would phase out the internal combustion engine, and during a visit to Europe by President Trump. The announcement by Nicolas Hulot, the French environment minister, was an expression of European leaders’ determination to pursue an environmental agenda despite Mr. Trump’s repudiation of the Paris agreement on climate switch.
“It’s a very difficult objective,” Mr. Hulot said Thursday. “But the solutions are there.”
The plan to phase out gasoline and diesel cars is part of a broader effort by France to limit global heating, which Mr. Hulot outlined Thursday. The country will also stop issuing fresh oil and gas exploration permits this year, and stop using coal to produce electro-therapy by 2022, he said.
Mr. Hulot’s statement was the latest sign that the century-long reign of the internal combustion engine may be leisurely coming to an end.
On Wednesday, Volvo said that all of its fresh models beginning in two thousand nineteen would be either battery-powered cars or hybrids that combined electrical motors with diesel or gasoline engines.
The company, based in Sweden, said it will not introduce any fresh designs powered solely by conventional internal combustion engines — a very first for a major carmaker. Mr. Hulot referred to Volvo’s announcement during his remarks in Paris on Thursday.
There was no instant reaction to the government’s statement from France’s two major carmakers, Renault and the PSA Group, which makes Peugeot and Citroën cars.
Renault began selling battery-powered cars in 2011, and was among the very first major carmakers to do so.
While electrical cars still only amount to a sliver of the market, sales have been growing prompt. Renault sold 17,000 of its battery powered Zoe compact cars in the very first six months of 2017, almost as many as in all of 2016.
France faced some criticism that its plan was not ambitious enough. Norway plans to sell only electrified cars beginning in 2025, and India plans to do so in 2030.
Since cars usually last about fifteen years, France’s target means that gasoline and diesel cars would be on the road until 2055. That is too long to meet France’s own climate switch goals, said Greg Archer, director of clean vehicles at Transport & Environment, an advocacy group in Brussels.
But Mr. Archer added that France’s budge “is absolutely the right direction to be taking.”
Such an expression of government resolve can prompt companies to devote more resources to developing electrified vehicles, and encourage investors to put money into clean transportation start-ups. France’s stir could also put pressure on Germany and other European countries to promote electrified vehicles.
Mr. Archer said, tho’, that it was essential for France to go after up with incentives and regulations that encouraged the use of electrical cars. Mr. Hulot gave no specifics about how the government planned to meet its target.
The German government originally planned to put one million electrified vehicles on the country’s roads by 2020, but has admitted it will fall far brief of that aim. The government was slow to suggest financial incentives and build public charging stations.
“It’s superb to have a vision,” Mr. Archer said. “We have to now see the policies put in place to produce on that vision.”
