Audi CEO Markus Duesmann mentioned the mid-2025 deadline to implement the pending Euro 7 air pollution rules must be pushed again as a result of it doesn’t give automakers sufficient time to arrange.

“That timeframe is solely not sufficient,” Duesmann mentioned at Audi’s annual information convention. 

The Euro 7 proposal, which governs tailpipe emissions of pollution similar to carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxide, in addition to nice particulates, gained preliminary approval final November. It additionally, for the primary time, proposes to manage particulate emissions from brake pads and tires.

It replaces the present Euro 6e customary. Automakers must recertify each powertrain of their portfolio, a prolonged and expensive course of. New applied sciences similar to upgraded gasoline particulate filters and catalysts must be developed and examined, and automakers say they must go most of these prices on to consumers.

The automotive business has portrayed Euro 7 as an unnecessarily distraction that may divert assets from the last word aim of electrification. Executives say the principles would apply solely to a closing technology of inner combustion engines forward of a proposal to permit solely zero-emission automobiles to be offered in Europe after 2035.

Advocates say that decreasing air pollution will save tens of hundreds of lives, and that even when the brand new guidelines are in place for simply 10 years or much less, automobiles ruled by them will likely be on the roads for a few years after being offered as new vehicles.

Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares, the previous president of the ACEA lobbying group, just lately referred to as the principles “ineffective” and counterproductive within the transition to EVs.

ACEA, which is led by Luca de Meo of Renault Group, says that “A large funding in Euro 7 would have solely marginal extra environmental profit, but would require producers to divert substantial engineering and monetary assets away from electrification and zero-emission automobiles again to inner combustion engine.”

“In the end, this carries a significant threat of slowing down the transition to local weather neutrality,” the group added ready paper in January.

De Meo, in his first tackle as ACEA president, mentioned that the rules may drive automakers to shut factories in Europe, as some automakers will choose to drop sure combustion engines from their lineup relatively than spend time and cash to recertify them.

Skoda’s head of gross sales, Martin Jahn, mentioned Sunday the Volkswagen Group Czech model must shut a plant and ax fashions if the Euro 7 scheme is applied in its present type.

“If (Euro 7) is authorised on this form, it could imply for Skoda Auto to shut one plant, as a result of we might cease producing the smaller fashions — the Fabia, Scala, Kamiq — which means 3,000 jobs [would be] hit not less than,” Jahn mentioned in a televised debate.

The auto business has the backing of transport ministers from a gaggle of nations led by Germany and Italy that’s calling for adjustments to the proposal. Ministers from Germany, Italy, the Czech Republic, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Hungary and Slovakia – most of whom have massive automaking sectors – met final Monday to debate Euro 7 and the EU’s zero-emission proposal for 2035. 

The group referred to as for a four-year phase-in interval.

“We’re of the agency opinion that we’d like an adjustment of the present proposal,” Duesmann mentioned final Thursday. “We’ve got spent numerous money and time within the improvement of electrical vehicles.”

A strict implementation of Euro 7, he mentioned, will draw investments away from EVs, and better costs for consumers “will actually put a damper on issues.”