The Volvo C40 is the Swedish car brand’s second fully electric vehicle… and it’s a-ma-zing.
There’s no hiding from it, Earth is in a perilous position, its natural resources and fragile ecological balance at risk of being forever destroyed due to humanity’s ongoing toxicity.
Collectively, we all have a responsibility to change how we live – both to give our planet a chance to catch its breath, and for future generations of people, fauna and flora to experience the beauty and magic of the world.
Small things – such as taking your own reusable cup to the coffee shop, buying dried foods and refillable detergent at BYO container shops, opting for second hand where possible – all add up, but there are areas where substantial change is needed.
2015 Volvo XC90 at Paris Motor Show
One of these areas is transport, with electric vehicles (EV) one day expected to become the norm over gas-guzzling petrol counterparts. Volvo was the first established car maker to commit to all-out electrification and aims to sell only pure electric cars by 2030.
To give me a chance to see what EV’s are all about – and to see for myself that they are just as efficient as traditional petrol and diesel powered cars – they generously let me borrow a C40 Recharge for a whole week.
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In support of his contention, however, Atkinson repeats a series of repeatedly debunked talking points, often used by those seeking to delay action on the climate crisis.
Moreover, he suggests alternatives to EVs that are not yet widely available, would be less beneficial to the climate and are guaranteed to be more costly.
Atkinson’s biggest mistake is his failure to recognise that electric vehicles already offer significant global environmental benefits, compared with combustion-engine cars.
While EVs won’t solve all of the problems associated with car use – from traffic congestion through to our increasingly sedentary lifestyles – they are an essential part of tackling the climate emergency.
In its latest report, for example, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said, with “high confidence”, that EVs have lower greenhouse gas emissions than conventional cars. The IPCC said that electric vehicles not only “offer the greatest low-carbon potential for land-based transport”, but their use would save money. (Despite elevated electricity prices, EVs are still much cheaper to run than petrol cars in the UK.)
Indeed, without a widespread shift to EVs, there is no plausible route to meeting the UK’s legally binding target of net zero greenhouse emissions by 2050 – and the same is true globally.
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Several automobile manufacturers have made pledges in recent months to halt or drastically reduce producing cars with internal combustion engines between 2030 and 2035.
Fuel Included BMW i3 on static display (Image: T. Larkum)
The latest was Audi, a subsidiary of Germany’s Volkswagen, which pledged Tuesday to launch only fully electric vehicles from 2026 and halt manufacturing cars with internal combustion engines by 2033. Here’s a look at other major automakers who have already set a deadline for their model line-ups to go fully electric.
BMW
The German carmaker has increased its electric vehicle sales targets as stricter EU emission limits are pushing all manufacturers to make the shift.
Over the coming decade, BMW now wants to sell 10 million fully-electric vehicles, up from its previous target of four million.
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Swedish carmaker also says it will sell its vehicles to consumers online only
Volvo plans to sell only electric cars by 2030 in the latest move by a legacy carmaker to abandon fossil fuels that contribute to global heating.
The Swedish carmaker also said it would sell its electric cars direct to consumers or via dealerships through the same simplified online portal, in a blow to the traditional model of selling vehicles via independent dealerships.
Volvo had previously said it wanted half of its sales to be electric by 2025, but it said on Tuesday its new strategy – which puts it in line with the UK’s 2030 ban on internal combustion engine sales – was an “acceleration” of plans to phase out internal combustion engine sales completely.
Håkan Samuelsson, the Volvo chief executive, said the company did not want to be stuck targeting a shrinking market for petrol and diesel cars. He expected the carmaker’s sales to continue to grow as it moved to electric technology.
“To remain successful, we need profitable growth,” he said. “So instead of investing in a shrinking business, we choose to invest in the future – electric and online. We are fully focused on becoming a leader in the fast-growing premium electric segment.”
Rivals that have in 2021 unveiled formal plans to abandon fossil fuels include the Jaguar brand (by 2025) and luxury carmaker Bentley (by 2030). Jaguar’s move had “encouraged us to be a bit braver”, Samuelsson said.
Volvo XC40 P8 (Image: media.volvocars.com)
Samuelsson added that he expected the cost of manufacturing an electric car to drop to the same level as internal combustion engine cars by 2025. In the longer term, the cost of manufacturing electric cars would be lower, he said, achieved through reducing the number of complex systems in the car and cutting the number of separate computers needed.
However, a customer in 2025 will probably still pay more compared with an equivalent hybrid version, Samuelsson said.
Volvo last year launched its first fully electric car, the XC40 Recharge, and it will unveil a new electric 40 Series on Tuesday. However, its higher-margin premium cars allowed it to be among the more advanced European legacy carmakers in the transition away from fossil fuels, including the launch of its Polestar all-electric brand to rival US electric car pioneer Tesla. Volvo also sells several plug-in hybrid electric vehicles.
Its electrified portfolio meant that Volvo easily achieved EU-mandated emissions targets in 2020. That allowed it to sell emissions credits to Ford for an undisclosed sum, helping the US carmaker avoid steep fines.
“There is no long-term future for cars with an internal combustion engine,” said Henrik Green, the Volvo chief technology officer. “We are firmly committed to becoming an electric-only carmaker and the transition should happen by 2030. It will allow us to meet the expectations of our customers and be a part of the solution when it comes to fighting climate change.”
The company recorded its best-ever profits in the second half of 2020 as the Chinese market rebounded from the fall in sales at the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
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We pit the world’s most popular electric car against its first true rival to see if the sales charts are due a shake-up
The year is 2010 and I’m explaining to you that, a decade from now, Volvo’s almost-unknown motorsport partner will be wrestling for supremacy with an American car company whose only product to date is an electric take on the Lotus Elise. You laugh, because it all just sounds so implausible. Tesla Motors will soon become the first US manufacturer to go public since Ford in 1956 and Polestar is starting to flex its appeal here in Europe, building go-faster versions of Volvo’s regular but increasingly attractive saloons. But the two hottest mass-market properties in an emerging low-carbon world order by 2020? Come on. Surely the German and Japanese giants would never let that happen…
Yet here we are, at Millbrook Proving Ground in Bedfordshire, with a Tesla Model 3 and a Polestar 2. The former needs scant introduction. The reptilian-eyed Model 3 remains the most popular electric car in both North America and China – and before Renault refreshed the Zoe, Europe also. Some treble, that. People gravitate towards Tesla because its cars tend to go further and charge faster than anything else, and even the lowliest Model 3 – the Standard Range Plus, which at £40,490 is the most junior Tesla and uses one motor, not two – can out-accelerate even something as rapid as Honda’s Civic Type R. Tesla also sets itself apart from established manufacturers ideologically, but you could write a book on that subject alone. The takeaway is that, for those keen to wean themselves off petrol, the Model 3 is one hell of a package.
Tesla Model 3 (Image: Tesla.com)
One thing it never had was a true rival, until now. The 2 is an electric car of Chinese, Swedish and, yes, British provenance (Polestar has a research and development base just off the M69, adjacent to where Rolls-Royce plc makes aeronautical fan cases) whose deadpan presence gives it the aura of something that could have escaped from a clandestine military facility. At £51,900 when fitted with the Performance Pack (which adds Brembo brakes, 20in wheels, gold detailing and, if you hadn’t heard, manually adjustable Öhlins dampers), it costs roughly what this Model 3 costs, and the quoted 292 miles of WLTP range certainly isn’t buried by the 329 miles of its rival.
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True, were you to go for the Long Range version of the Model 3 rather than the Performance tested here, you would cut the price from £56,490 to £46,990 and extend your one-hit reach by 19 miles. But equally, if you ditched the Performance Pack, the 2 would cost a near-identical amount.
As for pace, the Model 3 Long Range can accelerate from 0-60mph in 4.4sec and the 2 takes 4.7sec, so regarding the one metric that the EV evangelists just love to quote, there’s little in it. Or at least that would be true were our Model 3 not a Performance. Its 3.4sec sprint time is closer to that of the McLaren F1 than the 2, but in broad terms, these cars are still deliciously closely matched.
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We’ve been promised an electric future, and slowly but surely, it’s starting to appear over the horizon.
Manufacturers have been able to develop technologies to quell range anxiety, and work with power providers to create robust charging infrastructure. Government support, most visibly in the form of tax credits to consumers, has helped to lower the effective retail price gap between electric and gas vehicles. Demand is building.
As with all trends in the automotive industry, economics drive the direction of change. Developing and selling EVs has not yet turned into a profitable activity, even if Tesla stock prices give a different impression. Established car makers have been forced to get creative to try to leverage their existing assets to build a new electrified future, and find themselves in competition with startups (like Tesla), who can sometimes be decidedly nimble and focused on the task.
Volvo recognized the need to move to electrification early, and has committed to hybrid, plug-in hybrid and all-electric vehicles. At the same time, they wanted to get the startup advantage – a clean slate, fresh identity, and certain tax benefits, and the Polestar brand was born.
Volvo Polestar 2 (Image: Volvocars.com)
Polestar was founded in 1996 as a race engineering company, and became the official Volvo tuning partner in 2009. Volvo bought Polestar in 2015, and there have been “Polestar Engineered” trim levels and packages since then. Polestar became a separate company again in October 2017, now owned jointly by Geely (Volvo’s parent company) and Volvo, with the mission of becoming a “pure performance electrified brand.” Polestar’s home office is in Gothenburg, Sweden, and the Polestar production center is in Chengdu, China. Polestar 1 was the company’s first vehicle, a halo car with a total run of 1,500 units over three years beginning in 2019. The 2021 Polestar 2 is now arriving in the United States with the target of selling 2,000 units this year and tens of thousands next year.
By splitting off from Volvo (on paper, at least), Polestar is able to reset the counter on the US Government’s Federal Electric Vehicle Tax Credit. According to the Environmental Protection Agency’s FuelEconomy.gov, “All-electric and plug-in hybrid cars purchased new in or after 2010 may be eligible for a federal income tax credit of up to $7,500. The credit amount will vary based on the capacity of the battery used to power the vehicle. State and/or local incentives may also apply.” This tax credit lasts until a manufacturer has sold 200,000 qualifying vehicles, and then quickly sunsets and expires in the subsequent four quarters. Volvo has been eating into its 200,000 credits with its plug-in hybrids. With a fresh start and its own VIN run, Polestar will get a running start at Federal and state credits, where available, giving it an advantage over the obvious target, Tesla.
None of this matters unless the Polestar 2 is any good.
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A lack of choice has been one reason that buyers in Europe have not fully embraced full-electric and electrified plug-in hybrid cars.
But that is quickly changing as automakers prepare to launch more models to prepare for tougher CO2 emissions regulations that start to take effect in 2020.
The number of EVs on sale in Europe will increase to 24 this year from 18 last year as new vehicles such as the Audi e-tron, Tesla Model 3, Mercedes-Benz EQC, Mini EV and full-electric Volvo XC40 crossover hit the market, according to LMC Automotive data — which excludes very-low-volume niche models. The number of plug-in hybrids will nearly double to 53 this year from 27 in 2018, LMC says.
But the real jump will come in 2020, when the number of full-electric cars on sale doubles to 48 and plug-in-hybrid choice reaches almost 100, according to LMC data.
Peugeot e-208 (Image: Peugeot)
Next year battery-powered cars underpinned by Volkswagen Group’s flexible MEB electric-car platform and aimed at the mass-market will go on sale. VW brand’s Golf-sized I.D. hatchback will come first but it will soon be followed by MEB cars from the Audi, Skoda and Seat brands. They will have ranges of more than 550 km (342 miles), to ease range anxiety fears among car buyers.
It’s no coincidence that 2020 is also when the EU will start fining automakers if they miss their stricter CO2 reduction targets that are being implemented to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions blamed for contributing to climate change.
“We have only one target, which is to be compliant for CO2 targets for 2020, so 2019 will be the launch of all our electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles,” Maxime Picat, PSA Group’s operations director for Europe, told journalists in January.
Volvo is betting big on the vehicles, but the UK needs to invest in infrastructure to truly bring electric cars into the mainstream.
With Volvo’s announcement that the company is turning to only electric and hybrid engines in its new models from 2019, the industry is taking stock of how the energy network could cope with an influx of electric cars.
The uptake of electric or partly electric cars is already increasing at an impressive rate. Last year the number of registered vehicles rose by more than 50%.
But that’s still only around 100,000 – out of around 30 million cars in the country.
Volvo has bet big that this will change fast.
Philip New from Energy Systems Catapult says in the short term our energy grid should cope, but there could be problems.
“The likely pace of growth is something that the system can absorb for the next few years,”
he said.
“The caveat there is that if there’s clustering where too many people in one street are trying to charge their electric cars at the same time, that could cause a problem for the low voltage network and cause localised blackouts.
“In the future, if we get to penetrations of electric cars that are in the 60, 70, 80% range of take-up, that becomes part of the overall transformation of the energy system that needs looking at.”
Nothing is unfixable, but it will cost money. For example, putting in a thicker or entirely new cable down a cul-de-sac where a lot of residents have electric cars could cost tens of thousands of pounds. The question is who will pay for that?
Other solutions could be to install smart systems either in cars or in homes that help coordinate the charging of vehicles around peak times in the day and night.
Volvo’s move to electric demonstrates the role ethical business can play in shaping our society for the better
think a lot about electric cars,” Tesla CEO Elon Musk famously said at a party at the very end of the 80s. “Do you think a lot about electric cars?” The problem with thinking a lot about electric cars is that certain things become impossible to unthink: powering a car with fossil fuels, meeting 21st-century challenges with 19th-century answers, become more than irresponsible. It becomes ridiculous.
You’ll never know when the tipping point is – it’s possibly as little as five minutes – but think enough about electric cars, especially if you’re a car manufacturer, and wham … you’re Volvo. They were rolling along perfectly happily until they thought too hard: about their business model and benefit to society; about climate change and their future customers; and so they made the decision that all their cars would be fully electric, or at least hybrid, by 2019. Not one car solely powered by internal combustion engine will come off a Volvo production line by 2020.
It is impossible to overstate the significance of this, and not because you are ever likely to buy a brand-new Volvo. If every branded car is a Veblen good – that is, something you want precisely because it is expensive, to flag to the world your ability to own it – then the Volvo is a peculiar inversion, the car you buy that looks less flash than it is, to show the world that you’re not the kind of person who shows off what they’ve bought. Nope, nobody here is buying a brand-new Volvo in 2019.
Yet this will instantly change the charging infrastructure for electric cars: there have already been pretty extraordinary advances in charge speed. You can fully charge an electric vehicle – one with a range of about 105 miles – in half an hour from a supercharger in a garage, which is the difference between being able to use an electric car in a normal way, and having to rebuild your life around it. However, there aren’t enough superchargers, in Europe or the US, and, maddeningly, a lot of the slower chargers – which take four to six hours – still call themselves “high speed” because that’s what they were when they were installed. Volvo will shunt progress forward worldwide on genuinely high-speed charging points, as well as battery production and research and development into battery storage.
Volvo’s announcement on 5 July that from 2019 it would be making only EVs is not a statement about demand now, but about demand that manufacturers want to create.
For now, penetration of EVs is low. The global stock doubled from 1m units in 2015 to 2m last year, says the International Energy Agency—but that’s still less than 1% of the world’s fleet.
One percent seems a small market to pin your future on. But if Volvo, Tesla and the others have their way, the S-curve for EVs will deal with the rest. Marketing will too. Be ready for the spiel that forever renders the internal-combustion engine something akin to a Nokia 3310 handset and the battery-powered car like the iPhone 6: yesterday’s technology versus today’s.
Back to the future
In short, whatever the size of the market now, carmakers sniff an opportunity to revive their industry by selling not just another tired diesel or gasoline model but something that genuinely feels like it belongs in the same century as a smartphone. Scores of new models will be offered in the next two years—with longer ranges and smaller price tags.
Volvo is too small in most of the world to be anything but a symbol of this. As EV sceptic Cüneyt Kazokoglu, an analyst at Facts Global Energy, wrote on Twitter , despite the company’s “cheap marketing trick”, Volvo’s market share in Europe is just 1.8% and globally only 0.7%.
Still, since 2010, Volvo has been owned by Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, a Chinese conglomerate, and the announcement reflects the proprietor’s priorities. Chinese companies, like their government, are serious about EVs. Purchases there are soaring, thanks in part to subsidies. Beijing wants to increase annual sales tenfold in the next decade, to 7m units a year by 2025. Bloomberg New Energy Finance reckons EVs will account for all new-vehicle sales growth in the next eight years.
It’s hard to overstate how big a problem this is for the oil industry. First the obvious: real EV take-off from consumers has the potential to wipe millions of barrels of daily oil demand from forecasts, especially if trucks start plugging in too.
It would be a problem—though it might not be imminent. A mainstay of industry conferences are the speakers who line up to assure their audience of oil’s longevity, the developing world’s thirst for more crude, the resurgence of SUVs and the statistically peripheral position of EVs in the market. They’ve been right in the past (remember the peak oil threat?) and might be this time too.
If the oil industry’s best answer to EVs is a belief that consumers will resist their urge to buy shinier, more advanced, more efficient and, eventually, more economical technology, then investors will punish them. Pinning a business on hopes that drivers will stick with older, dirtier technology is risky.
Yet this will instantly change the charging infrastructure for electric cars: there have already been pretty extraordinary advances in charge speed. You can fully charge an electric vehicle – one with a range of about 105 miles – in half an hour from a supercharger in a garage, which is the difference between being able to use an electric car in a normal way, and having to rebuild your life around it. However, there aren’t enough superchargers, in Europe or the US, and, maddeningly, a lot of the slower chargers – which take four to six hours – still call themselves “high speed” because that’s what they were when they were installed. Volvo will shunt progress forward worldwide on genuinely high-speed charging points, as well as battery production and research and development into battery storage.
Read more: The Guardian