The EU is set to delay its petrol car ban until 2040, but what about the UK?

All the way back in 2020, the UK's then Prime Minister Boris Johnson confirmed his Government's commitment to the ban of new petrol and diesel cars, announcing a 2030 target, with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak shortly delaying the ban until 2035. The current Labour government then reverted to the initial 2030 deadline. 

It’s clear that the UK can’t quite decide what’s best, but then it seems not many leaders can. Numerous industry sources have now revealed that the EU is set to announce a change to its incoming policy, likely pushing its current 2035 ICE ban to 2040. Sources from within car manufacturers themselves have said the announcement will be made soon, but exactly when isn’t yet known.

> evo Podcast: Listen to our discussion on the combustion-ban here

Pressure from European manufacturers could well have been the catalyst for this change. This news comes not long after Porsche announced a bold change to its powertrain development roadmap, extending support for combustion-powered models and delaying the launch of some pure electric vehicles. While Stuttgart has been one of the first, it’s expected to lead the way for similar moves from other manufacturers that may have to change tact to remain competitive, even if it costs them in the short term. 

Even as early as 2022 some OEMs were starting to push back at the holes in the UK and Europe’s policies, not arguing the case for reducing emissions, rather highlighting the fact that most cars on the road in 2030 will still use internal combustion engines. In 2022 Oliver Zipse, chairman of the board of management at BMW, urged Europe and the United Kingdom not to ‘put a policy in place that ends the combustion engine’. He went on to urge the UK government to review its strategy for the sale of combustion engines from 2030. 

> 2030 petrol ban cancelled for low-volume car manufacturers like Ferrari

As in the UK, the EU’s combustion ban won’t make combustion-powered vehicles themselves illegal, but will outlaw the sale of them from new – as a result, all new cars sold would be required to be fully electric by 2040 should the revised policy come into effect. Britain’s current stance grants lenience to plug-in hybrid models, which won’t be banned until five years after the present 2030 ban of pure ICE models.

The UK’s original combustion-ban announcement in 2020 coincided with a £4bn investment in the UK’s charging infrastructure and battery production to support an increase in electric vehicle sales, along with more than £500million made available to incentivise people to switch to electric and hydrogen powered vehicles. Five years on, the current Labour government announced a pay-per-mile tax for EVs, a move that would make them considerably more expensive to run and potentially reduce EV sales in the process, albeit after reintroducing purchase grant incentives.