They have been preparing for several years, and the wall is now approaching at high speed. 2020 is a fateful year for car manufacturers, who will have to meet their CO2 emissions obligations or be severely sanctioned by Brussels.
The accounts will be made at the end of next year. The sales of each manufacturer will be scrutinized, and each will compare with anxiety the average CO2 emissions of its registrations with the level expected by the community authorities. Beware of those who will not be in the nails!
Regularly, consultants engage in scholarly theoretical calculations, referring to fines of several hundred million euros. It is true that the builders still seem far from the average goal (95 grams of CO2 per kilometer NEDC standard): their emissions even increased last year, to 120.4 g / km.
In reality, no one can claim to know the amount of the final bill. Because the means to achieve the objectives are many, and some will be deployed only from January 1st. PSA even put in place about a year ago a CO2 committee chaired by the big boss, Carlos Tavares, to pilot the thing. “We have developed an ultra-precise calculation method, which allows us to evaluate our emissions to the nearest 0.1 g. But we keep the recipe for us! Says a spokesman.
All manufacturers, except perhaps Daimler-Mercedes , swear they will meet the targets in 2020. Review the five great levers they can use.
. Sell electric cars … after January 1st
This is obviously the most effective lever: the most virtuous vehicles, those that emit less than 50 g / km (100% electric cars or rechargeable hybrids) will count double in the calculation of the average. “It’s the cheapest way! Insisted Herbert Diess, CEO of the Volkswagen Group, at the Frankfurt Motor Show.
Builders have spent billions to develop an attractive offer available early next year. The whole question now is to know what a welcome will find the Volkswagen ID3, Peugeot e-208, Opel Corsa-e , or Renault Zoe – while the electric vehicle represents only less than 3% of the market.
“The analysis of current sales is not relevant to answer the question, notes Denis Schemoul, analyst at IHS. The only sales that will count are those of 2020: the manufacturers have every interest in staggering their registrations after January 1st. In fact some vehicles, like the ID3, or the e-208, will not be in the dealerships until next year – a bet because other models, like the new Renault Zoe, have been there for several weeks.
The battle over prices has already begun, with long-term rental formulas offering rents of less than 200 euros. Not to mention the incentives to sell electric vehicles: Opel has already planned to make the premium of its distributors depend on it.
. Find “captive” clients
“If the market does not take off, the manufacturers will still be able to activate their bonus card number one: encourage their employees to choose battery-powered cars, thanks to attractive prices,” said Berlin auto analyst Matthias Schmidt. The corresponding fleets are huge! With its twelve brands (VW, Audi, Seat, Skoda, etc.), the giant Volkswagen alone has nearly 300,000 employees in Germany alone. However, it will be necessary to find the right arbitration between proposed discounts, which will inevitably weigh on the profitability, and the fines avoided.
In the same vein, car-sharing fleets that are developing at a high speed can also help to get on course. ” BMW and Daimler already have a fleet of 20,000 vehicles via their ShareNow service, which should expand, “says the analyst. Volkswagen plans to launch a massive offensive in Europe (Hamburg, Prague, London or even Paris), having already deployed 1,500 eGolfs in Berlin. Renault and PSA are engaged in a similar approach – on lower volumes for now.
. Make the engines cleaner
With CO2 in sight, manufacturers have taken care to design the new generations of their range less fuel – therefore less emitting. With its 3-cylinder engine (replacing a 4-cylinder) and a new gearbox, the new Opel Astra has CO2 emissions that are 21% lower than those of the previous model. What singularly improve the performance of Opel: the Astra represents 20% of its sales. Ford or BMW will include a 48-volt hybridization to all their vehicles – a technology that can reduce emissions by 10 to 15 percent at low cost.
“There are many ways to improve emissions from conventional engines: hybridization or lightening of vehicles, use of less rolling-resistant tires,” says Florent Grelier, author of a study on the subject. for the NGO Transport & Environment. “But also sharp improvements on the engine itself: that’s what allowed Volkswagen to gain 6 grams on its new Golf. “
European regulations also provide for bonuses if the vehicle includes “eco-innovations”, such as LED headlights or a more efficient alternator. Another example is “coasting”, a device consisting in reducing the speed of the engine, or even turning it off when possible (downhill for example). “These new technologies can save a few grams, but they are still very little used: less than 4% of registrations in 2018,” notes Florent Grelier.
. Clean up the catalog
More radical, the manufacturers will also be able to simply withdraw concessions their most polluting vehicles. They will not necessarily be interested in 2020: only 95% of sales will be taken into account in the calculation that year. But from 2021, some will have no choice.
Many have already begun to clean up their catalogs, particularly during the transition to the summer of 2018 to a new homologation standard. Mercedes has announced the removal of its largest engine, the V12 biturbo. Opel has also abandoned its minivan Zafira, as well as its city dwellers Adam and Karl, as well as Ford for his little Ka +. “It’s way too expensive to put small cars up to standard! “Says a builder.
If the decision is easy to make for models that sell poorly and are unprofitable, arbitration will probably be more complicated on “cash machines”, like SUVs which are all the rage at the moment – but are among the (very) bad students. Or for sports models GTI style and similar, which bring few sales but remain a vector of image.
. Make a deal with a virtuous builder
This is the no less radical strategy adopted by Fiat Chrysler, who broke his piggy bank to form a “pool” with Tesla: the Italian-American manufacturer will pay 1.8 billion euros to benefit from CO2 credits from the manufacturer of electric cars in Europe, for three years. Mazda has made a similar deal with Toyota, well placed thanks to its hybrid cars – without specifying the amounts involved.
The practice is accepted by the European authorities, but it makes the competitors cringe. “Pay for the right to pollute is average,” blows one of them. For the more virtuous, it can however represent a nice reward.
