UK Follows France's 2040 Lead on Cars, But Without a Roadmap
The UK is to ban the sale of new petrol and diesel cars in 2040, following the lead set three weeks ago by France.
The July 26 announcement by UK environment and transport ministers, however, came without a roadmap outlining how the transition to 2040 will be planned, in contrast to France where tax incentives were set out for alternative transport fuels, including natural gas vehicles (NGVs).
The UK government has faced growing legal action from residents’ groups and the European Commission to comply with EU safe limits for nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and the thrust of the July 26 announcement is about giving London and other local authorities powers to implement their own plans to improve air quality and to bid for central government funds to finance them. Poor air leads to over 400,000 premature deaths across the EU each year.
Transport Secretary Chris Grayling nonetheless said: “We are taking bold action and want nearly every car and van on UK roads to be zero emission by 2050 which is why we’ve committed to investing more than £600mn ($783mn) in the development, manufacture and use of ultra-low emission vehicles by 2020. Today we commit £100mn towards new low emission buses and retrofitting older buses with cleaner engines. We are also putting forward proposals for van drivers to have the right to use heavier vehicles if they are electric or gas-powered.”
The government is expected to make further announcements in 2018, not least on a wider clean air strategy. But for now, when asked what guidance was being given to industry on new fiscal incentives in the run-up to 2040, a spokesperson from the principal department, the environment ministry (Defra) told NGW: “It’s too early to say, 2040 is 23 years away. The government is moving on its support for low-emission vehicles but not yet signalling whether gas or electric.”
UK-based consultancy Wood Mackenzie’s senior vice president, refining and chemicals research Alan Gelder, said: “If auto manufacturers can deliver this, then oil demand will peak and then decline swiftly. According to our base case analysis, we expect there to be over 34mn passenger cars on UK roads by 2035, of which over 4mn battery electric vehicles.
“By 2035, we expect the remaining internal combustion engine passenger fleet will continue to consume over 6mn metric tons of gasoline and 7mn mt of diesel per year. This amounts to a 40% reduction compared to the amount of fuel consumed by cars today. However, UK total oil demand decline is projected to be only 20%, due to demand growth from airlines and commercial vehicles," added Gelder.
On July 24, the UK government published a strategy to boost investment in batteries for homes and in transport. Despite Brexit, German auto-maker BMW pledged the next day to invest in a new unit at its existing Mini plant at Oxford to manufacture fully-electric Mini cars, rather than one in Germany.
Mark Smedley