VW workers’ council head warns against tight EU car emissions standards

A tightening of European limit values for car emissions could spell trouble for Germany’s largest carmaker VW, workers’ council head Bernd Osterloh told journalists, according to Handelsblatt. He said the company would have to sell about one million e-cars by 2025 to meet the emissions limits proposed by the European Commission, but the lack of charging infrastructure and battery costs make it difficult to achieve this goal. “Of course, we’ve got work to do in the car industry – but if there’s no infrastructure it’s going to be hard to convince people to buy an e-car,” Osterloh argued. If no progress is made on the two crucial e-car issues (range and price), the shift to the technology could become “a failure,” he said.

Read the article in German here.

For background, read the factsheet Dieselgate forces VW to embrace green mobility, and the dossier BMW, Daimler, and VW vow to fight in green transport revolution.