The idea of the Minister of Enterprise and Made in Italy Adolfo Urso to bring forward to next year the review of the 2035 deadline regarding the halt to the production of internal combustion engines is excellent. He will present it on September 25 in Europe to the Council for Competitiveness with this meme: “Revise the deadline immediately, the industry risks collapse”. Not only the Italian one of the related industries and components, but also the European one, as demonstrated by the Volkswagen case. The current situation is absurd: European politics, which should act in the interest and on the mandate of the citizens, has made it possible to build cars that very few motorists want. A plan implemented not only by granting aid and financing to those who open factories serving electric mobility, but above all by severely punishing those who manufacture and import those deemed to be polluting, based on emissions and the quantity of units sold. You will have noticed that numerous models have disappeared from the price lists, while others are sold approved as trucks to avoid fines, giving up the back seats. If it’s not madness, it’s very close to it, because from next January 1st, when the pollution limits will be further reduced, very heavy fines will be imposed. If the 2035 limit is tragic, none of the current CEOs of automotive groups will still be in their positions to face it and the market has already demonstrated the impossibility of following the suicidal path traced by former commissioner Frans Timmermans. Instead, January 2025 from an industrial point of view is practically “tomorrow” and the issue becomes burning. Things are like this: the emission limit has so far been 116 g/km of carbon dioxide, but by also selling electric vehicles the fines were avoided. From 2025 the limit drops to 94 g/km and is practically unattainable for almost all manufacturers. And for every gram that exceeds the maximum limit, 95 euros must be paid multiplied by the number of vehicles. As CEO of Renault and president of Acea, Luca de Meo has called for more flexibility in the phases for the ecological transition, calculating that the 2025 fines for manufacturers would reach the record figure of 15 billion. The alternative for manufacturers is to be forced to build more electric vehicles that will remain unsold, or will be sold at prices too low to cover costs. The manager declared: “If there are current demands for electric, the European industry will probably have to pay those huge fines or give up producing around 2.5 million vehicles”. Moral: an employment catastrophe, the electric flop causes the end of projects related to its supply chain, from the large battery factories hypothesized in Europe to those of charging stations, inevitably showing the weak side to Chinese exports. Furthermore, the premature and useless elimination of the latest generation diesel engines, combined with policies of strong restrictions on circulation, up to state incentives, has created a commercially unsustainable situation, with still very healthy and relatively modern cars withdrawn at ridiculous prices and heading for the East and Africa. Meanwhile, according to the market analysis company Dataforce, manufacturers are very far from the sales targets they had planned. Ford, for example, had planned to sell battery-powered vehicles for 35% of production and in 2024 it will not reach 14%. Volkswagen is threatening to close factories also because from a dreamed 36%, it will probably not exceed 15%. Among the most serious errors, thinking that all motorists were potentially interested or in the conditions to switch to electric, while private needs have shown otherwise and the sale of battery-powered cars is decreasing. Lack of freedom from charging stations, high prices and a large gap between cost and actual value are the most frequent reasons that lead to choosing the petrol-electric solution. Some municipal councils are already thinking of tightening the restrictions to force the switch to battery-powered cars, but the aging population and the habits of the new generations, moreover made up of people who cannot afford an electric car, lead to giving up the private car, a fact that makes the greenest mayors happy but contributes to killing the industry. There are no excuses, it is not a question of hindsight or even good intentions, but rather of having stubbornly wanted to go against the laws of physics by embracing a technology that is still largely immature with regard to the production and conservation of energy. If we had let the market decide, today we would perhaps have already seen Euro7 diesel cars, more hybrid cars, manufacturers not victims of legalized blackmail and we would have a greater choice in terms of models to choose from. So, probably, it would not even have been necessary to talk about duties for Chinese cars.
