Automotive News Europe — 2024-09-15
Automotive Industry
Stellantis is pushing back against any move by the European Union to delay emissions targets set to take effect next year, setting up a potential clash with other automakers in the region.
"It would be surreal to change the rules now," CEO Carlos Tavares told Agence-France Presse.
A spokesman for Stellantis confirmed the comments and provided a company statement in support of keeping the current regulation. The statement calls for continued government subsidies for consumers toward the purchase of electric vehicles.
"Everyone has known about the rules for a long time and has had time to prepare, and so now it's time to have a race," Tavares said in the interview published on September 12.
Tavares said Stellantis has readied EVs and put in place the means to sell them.
The EU rules target overall CO2 fleet emissions of about 95 g/km in 2025, down from 106.6 g/km in 2023.
ACEA, the European automakers lobby group, has drafted a proposal to ask the EU to use emergency regulation to delay its 2025 emissions target for automakers by two years.
Meeting the target would require automakers to either halt production of about 2 m cars or be exposed to fines that could reach €13b ($14b) for passenger cars and another €3 billion for vans, according to ACEA estimates contained in the draft of the document and seen by Bloomberg.
The president of ACEA, Renault CEO Luca de Meo, has also said he would like to see more EU flexibility on the rules.
Tavares pulled Stellantis out of ACEA in 2022 and the automaker said on September 12 that it has organized itself to comply by lowering costs, rolling out new models and facing competition from Chinese manufacturers and Tesla.
In a September 12 statement on its website, ACEA said that the EU automotive industry "has invested billions in electrification to put vehicles on the market, but the other necessary ingredients for this transition are not in place and the competitiveness of the EU is eroding."
Europe's auto sector is struggling with cheaper models from China, high energy costs and slow consumer demand, with sales remaining well below pre-pandemic levels.