Governments worldwide are making rules that say car companies have to make electric vehicles (EVs) instead of regular cars with engines that burn gas. They’re doing this to stop climate change and keep our homes from getting flooded, which is important.
But the people who make regular cars aren’t happy about it. For example, the CEO of Stellantis, Carlos Tavares, talked to reporters from the UK and said that the UK’s rules about EVs would “kill” the car industry there.
Tavares understands why the government wants more electric cars instead of ones with engines that burn gas. But he thinks they’re going about it the wrong way. He thinks the rules should match what people are already buying.
He said this while talking to reporters at one of Stellantis’s factories in Ellesmere Port, UK. He thinks it makes sense for the government to make car companies sell more electric cars, but not if it’s way more than what people actually want to buy.
If the rules force car companies to sell more electric cars than people are buying anyway, then those rules aren’t really helping. The point is to change what people want to buy, but car companies don’t like that idea. They want to keep making the cars that sell well now, so they can make a lot of money every three months.
If car sales are already higher than what the government says they have to be, then the government doesn’t need to force them to do it. Tavares thinks the government should make rules that match what people want to buy, but when you think about it, that idea doesn’t make much sense.
