General Motors aims to get rid of sale of gasoline vehicles by 2035
30 January, 2021
General Motors is setting a goal to market all its different cars, SUVs and light pickup trucks with zero tailpipe emissions by 2035, a dramatic shift by the most significant US automaker away from gasoline and diesel engines.
GM, which as well said it strategies to be carbon neutral by 2040, made the dramatic announcement just over weekly after President Joe Biden took office pledging to deal with greenhouse gas emissions and increase sales of electric vehicles.
GM sold 2.55 million vehicles in the US last year, but only about 20,000 were EVs, the Chevy Bolt hatchback. It explained in November it was trading $27 billion in electric and autonomous vehicles over another five years, up from $20bn planned prior to the coronavirus pandemic.
Leader Mary Barra has aggressively pushed GM to embrace EVs and shift from gasoline-powered vehicles.
Morgan Stanley auto analyst Adam Jonas said the decision is "based principally on financial grounds”.
Mr Jonas added that investors should search for most if not absolutely all auto makers "to check out GM’s precedent”.
In September, California Governor Gavin Newsom said the state plans to ban the sale of innovative gasoline-powered passenger vehicles starting in 2035. Countless states, including Massachusetts, declare they intend to follow suit.
Mr Newsom called GM's announcement a good "game-changer" however the California Air Resources Board said "if GM is seriously interested in clearing up the air our kids breathe today, it must drop its defence of the Trump administration's rollbacks of federal vehicle emissions standards."
GM and other major automakers sided with Donald Trump this past year in a legal task to his rollback of federal vehicle emissions benchmarks through 2026.
However, in November, GM withdrew from another legal case in which it got sided with the Trump administration work to bar California from setting its vehicle emissions rules.
Last week, Mr Biden directed US agencies to reconsider the previous emissions rollback and the revocation of California's emissions authority.
GM is "available to dealing with California and the Biden administration to attain agreement on a national normal and complementary guidelines to accelerate the electrification of the light-duty transportation sector," the company said in another statement.
Source: www.thenationalnews.com