General Motors has outlined a plan to stop selling emissions-producing vehicles by as early as 2035. While this eco-friendly goal is admirable, GM wants customers to know that it’s just that, a goal, and not necessarily a guarantee.
Speaking to Automotive News last week, GM North America president Steve Carlisle explained that GM will still produce internal combustion engine vehicles as long as demand justifies it. While GM still believes the future is all-electric, it realizes that the EV adoption rate will be impacted by a multitude of different factors, including battery advancement and charging infrastructure.
“We intend to win wherever we’re competing and irrespective of propulsion system,” GM North America chief Steve Carlisle told AN. “At the same time, we’re setting ourselves up for this pivot, which is inevitable.”
Steve Carlisle
Investing heavily into an electric vehicle portfolio and keeping popular internal combustion engine products around will allow GM to keep its current customer base whilst growing into new EV segments, Carlisle explained. Promoting EV tech will also convince its competitors to produce their own EVs, the automaker hopes, in turn creating more demand for charging infrastructure and increasing demand for EVs in general.
“We’re going to do everything we can possibly do to make that future come true,” Carlisle said. “There’s a bit of leading the horse to water.”
Certain states have already begun to implement their own bans on the sale and registration of new internal combustion engine vehicles. California and Massachusetts will outlaw new internal combustion engine vehicle sales by 2035, while Washington State plans to one-up them with its own 2030 ban.
GM CEO Mary Barra
GM, which currently only offers one electric model in the way of the Chevy Bolt EV, will have 30 EVs on sale globally by 2025. More than two thirds of these EV models will be available in North America and will span the automaker’s Cadillac, GMC, Chevrolet and Buick brands. It also promises to offer EVs “at all price points for work, adventure, performance and family use,” in this timeframe.
“Climate change is real, and we want to be part of the solution by putting everyone in an electric vehicle,” GM CEO Mary Barra said in a prepared statement released earlier this year. “We are transitioning to an all-electric portfolio from a position of strength and we’re focused on growth. We can accelerate our EV plans because we are rapidly building a competitive advantage in batteries, software, vehicle integration, manufacturing and customer experience.”
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Comments
In other words…. we know it ain’t gonna happen, but we need to look cool and suck up to the elites. While you can “lead a horse to water, you can’t make them drink.” At least he acknowledged that ICE engines are not going away. Shows that at least they know their goals are a load of BS. I read an interview of the CEO of American Airlines last year, where the reporter asked him about investing into “eletric airplanes” 🤦♂️ and he responded very politically correctly “America airlines is looking into alternatives, but will use Jet A until one is found.” Aka, keep dreaming bucko.
Also, PSA to Washington state, you are on a fast track to becoming like Venezuela, and if you act in such a way, most people will move to other states that are not EV friendly, and charge additional EV taxes because they circumvent gas taxes. In doing so you actually will promote the sale of ICE vehicles.
yep, ICE is not going anyway anytime soon.
I’d said it was political pandering in the first place so Old Joe can stay off GMs back, that stated EVs should be a free market choice for buyers but not required.
The EV segment is going to grow government or not. The plan all along has been to keep ICE in some capacity till at least 2050. Most MFGs have that.
But the reality is the ICE power plants will be in limited applications and not in most vehicles. Expect trucks and maybe the Corvette.
It is time to stop thinking it is all government as the Automakers now that they have started to get a handle on this are wanting to make the move as it will be cheaper and more profitable in the future. They also know know that most of their goals in range and charging will be met.
This is all about free market and capitalism as they are more focused on stock prices and profits than Biden.
Creepy Old Joe is going to try to take the credit but all these automakers making the change at this point would be doing it Joe or no Joe.
The cost of the ICE is just going to cost more and more while the batteries and EV motors will only get cheaper. This is all about profits and not saving trees.
The only way Creepy Joe gets credit for this is if a bunch of out of touch people give him the credit.
Quick question, when I can buy a Malibu for 15k, how is that segment going to convince consumers to switch to BEV’s when the current price of the bolt is 30k, and even if batteries were priced half as much, that would be a smaller car for 20k. I still don’t see it happening ever except for with enthusiasts. Even now with lots of tesla’s being sold, howany will buy EV’s next as they see the huge hole it made in their wallet or drive a loaner ICE or friends truck and decide to switch back? Already a survey showed nearly 1/10 truck owners (majority toyota and nissan) were not as pleased with their purchase as planned and were going to return to cars and crossovers. It’s not once an EV, always an EV. The numbers don’t add up, but what does add up was how In 2005 the SUV was declared dead, and cars like the Prius were the future. Now in 2020, the sedan is what’s dead. These people making predictions really just need to be fired. They just suck at it.
You have no insight or vision of what is going on beyond the head lines. The cost of batteries were never going to go below $100 KWH according to most. GM and Tesla both have beat that.
GM is working on an second gen and now third gen battery to be here by 2025 with below $60 KWH. As improvements are made and technology investment cost are recovered these prices will continue to drop.
New Carbon batteries are now in development that eliminate Cobalt and other expensive metals with even better charging to come with is.
Now many said the V8 and the sedan of which GM used to sell over a million of in the Caprice would never go away. They did. We are now down to mostly 4 cylinders and now 2 cylinders to meet CAFE and Emission. They have added turbos, more expensive FI systems and computers but yet the gains are small and the you can only cut so many cylinders and so much car out.
It will get to the point that if you want any kind of performance you will need an electric motor or if you want a vehicle larger than a Sonic you will have to go EV.
People were not pleased with small FWD cars in the 80’s so they went to larger SUV and trucks to replace them.
You also need to remember by the the time of the ICE engine comes it will be 20-30 years from now and most of the petty complaints will be long gone with charge time less than a fill of gas and ranges as good or better than what we have now in gas. The cost of the ICE models left will be very high and the EV models will continue to decline.
I am not an EV guy by any means as I make my living in the racing industry but this is what is going on. You don’t have to like it but you need to grasp the reality of it. Even my firm is now working to get into selling performance parts for EV cars as they know that it is coming no matter how much we resist. Even racer Don Garlits said it is coming and no one is going to stop it.
You may never get a $15K Malibu but this may stop you from paying $60K for an emissions legal BU.
Reality check. No car in America today uses 2 cylinders 🤣🤣🤣. And yeah, given that you are claiming that it will take batteries 10 years or so to get those boondoggle “carbon batteries”, hmmm wonder where we could find a hydrocarbon power source….. As far as energy density goes, unless you go atomic, hydrogen is the highest power density. That’s why rockets use it, not heavy metals, not carbon fuels. Hydro carbons are a close second. There is no way you can get any sort of battery close. Sure you can develop some kind of fuel cell that uses gas but doesn’t that defeat the purpose? Also in that 10 year time frame, ICE engines will improve, slashing EV’s advantage to 20 years from now, and 20 years from now ICE improvements will slash it to 30 years. Already we have experimental ICE engines with mid 50% efficiently. Imagine what it would cost to have a small high efficient ICE engine that is efficiently enouggt to remove the radiator? ICE will just get cheaper.
It was a typo but 2 cylinders are in use in Japan and will be coming here if ICE is to survive.
Again the rest of your post shows you are not in touch with why this is now happening.
The most laughable line is ICE will get cheaper. Well it’s not gotten cheaper since the 60’s.
Radiators are not going away on any ICE engine.
From a pure technology perspective it is hard to argue that EVs will not eventually prevail over ICE. Having said that, the current technology level is not ready to go from 2-3% of new vehicles to 75-80% in the next 15 years. Current batteries are 1000-1500 lb monsters requiring huge amounts of material to manufacture them and eventually recycle them. Even if we ignore the obvious environmental concerns of mining and disposal the simple equation of supply and demand will drive up material prices as automakers compete to manufacture 10 – 12 MILLION of these huge batteries EVERY YEAR. Material costs will skyrocket even with improved battery technology and the cost / supply issue could get even worse (ref the current chip shortage as an example). On the infrastructure side, our already old electrical grid will require costly updates to switch to renewable power and to replace the energy that is presently supplied by gasoline. The switch to EVs is far more than a technology issue and is not so easily solved.
That’s why GM needs to launch asap a new Malibu, Equinox, Colorado and a BOF Colorado-based SUV. GM BEVS looks promising but will sell in low volumes.
Once people realize EV’s use more fossil fuel to build and get those precious metals for the batteries destory water/land more than fossil fuels you will see a pull back on this. I think GM wants do go all electric to show the public and government that they understand climate change. The reality is we humans are not going to do anything to affect the climate if anything we will destroy the enviroment and fress water by mining for things we really don’t need. The climate will just go on as it wants too.
Anyone see the Tesla crash article today? That should scare everyone!
I saw it, and this is just another one in a long line of crashes that tesla’s have caused. The musk keeps saying that tesla’s are less likely to get into crashes and point out the rate of crashes that tesla’s get into vs all other cars combined. He forgets that most of those other crashes are caused by drunk driving in old beaters, and not literally the cars fault.
It took 4 hrs to put out. HMM seems batteries in accidents are very hard to put out. They have fire stuff for batteries but its also toxic. I’m sure they didn’t catch any of the water that they used and all those battery chemicals are now in the soil and water. This is why battery cars are not the answer for wide spread use.
4hrs of combustion could generate a lot of electricity. recycling problem solved!!!
All that shows is the lack of training on the Fire Dept. that responded to the crash.
Same thought I had, we had to train on dealing with both hybrid and ev’s crashes due to the electrical systems. Both for extraction and fire suppression due the different minerals used in batteries which aren’t able to be extinguished by water.
Rolling firebombs – and the energy density of these cells must continue to increase if they are to realize their goal of an all EV future. Consequently, battery flammability will likely intensify with each new energy density leap. And at what environmental cost in mining and end-of-life recycling of the massive amounts of rare-earth metals required for battery production on such a grand scale?
All this while China actively tightens its grip on the rare-earths it wholly controls via Belt and Road. Shall we mention the PRC’s horrible environmental record which isn’t likely to improve much without significantly greater global pressure than any of the “Neutered Nations” dare exert on them now?
The technocracy has determined THIS is how we’ll “save the planet”?? Patent nonsense. As long as the world is beholden to China, mankind’s negative impact on the environment will only worsen steadily.
The Fire chief came out and completely debunked yet another FUD Tesla story. He said the fire was put out in two to three minutes and the reports out there in the Media are insane. They kept some water going just to keep the Batteries cooled down just to be safe.
I don’t drive a Tesla or use their auto pilot so I could care less.
Might care if one hits you.
30,000 gallons of water to put out fire. Wrong suppressant I would say, but what else did fire dept have? Also read Oil Co. say losing money right now installing charging station at their rest stops. Not enough return on investment.
As long as the USA doesn’t sign a mandate like China and Europe for when we must be pure BEVs then I could totally see ICE engines still being sold in small numbers in say 2035 in the USA
Give me an ev. The older generation probably will fight this all tooth and nail since that’s why they do. Diesels for commercial haulers makes sense. But once people drive an electric car, they all want one.
Not me!
Jake help me here. I think this “all ev by 2035” is a lofty goal. You seem like an “all in ev” type guy so perhaps you have or know the answer here.
I have asked this numerous times here and no one, not one person, has been able to answer. Where and how are all these new ev owners going to charge their vehicle? I live in Chicago and park on the street along with hundreds of thousands of other drivers, I go out to the suburbs where there are countless apartment/condo complexes with up to a hundred vehicles, where do those drivers charge their vehicle? Are we to put a charging station every hundred feet on every residential street in Chicago to charge all these new evs?
I totally support automakers selling a variety of vehicles including evs. If you’ve been paying attention only a couple automakers have come out and said they will stop making ICE vehicles (and now it appears GM is backpedaling) – this will drive customers, no ev folks like me, over to the competition who still offer ice vehicles.
@tmw
Right now EV Models are growing faster in the US than the Charging Infrastructure.
Not too long from now, there will be DC Fast Chargers at most shopping centers, Grocery Stores, and places like like Movie Theaters and stuff. Plus just like in Europe and China, Gas Stations will eventually shift from offering liquid gasoline that requires huge underground Tanks and Transport services to bring said liquid to simply offering Electricity that will require almost nothing but installation. And the Smart ones will add Solar with Battery Backup and make more money selling electricity to their customers than they ever made selling Gasoline.
There will be so many DC Charging stations everywhere that it will become so easy to charge a vehicle in the future that people will most likely not even notice it during their day.
Now far into the Future almost all parking spots on the street, parking lots, and parking garages will have Conductive charging and then it really will be stupid easy to charge. But that is way into the Future.
Right now EV’s are not for everyone in the US. Soon they will be.
Remember that Europe and China are selling EV’s in droves and the majority of the population lives in big apartment buildings in congested Big Cities. It is just that their Charging Infrastructure is much more advanced than ours as of right now.
Hope that kind of helps.
Momolos – thanks for the insight and continuing the dialogue here.
What you say here makes sense, yes at some point there will be many docking/charging stations everywhere, but i still have a hard time envisioning this realistically working in on a scale of millions of vehicles – or hundred of thousands street parking/parking lot drivers. I don’t see realistically the end of the ICE vehicle ever and would argue with your “soon they (ev’s) will be for everyone” (at least not in my life-time, maybe generations from now).
Something else I have said repeatedly is that when Toyota came out with the Prius that was supposed to be such a game changer in the automotive landscape – that was almost 25 years ago and the ICE engine still rules the road. I’ll agree this push for ev’s is different, but to think it will bring an end to ICE vehicles is not realistic – this GM backpedaling is proof. just my 2 cents here.
Nice to see someone has some common sense at GM.
How in the world will multi-car families in urban areas with multiple apartments body’s and only in street parking going to operate an EV when you’re lucky to find parking? In winter cars are buried for days in snow.
This is why savvy EV owners store a gas-powered generator in their trunks – it’s not like you’re likely to get a jump-start out in the street or stranded on the side of the road. . . .
a gas generator powering up an ev – I like your thought here.
Exactly.
Where, on Mars?
this sounds more realistic, making majority of vehicles BEV, while keeping a few ICE vehicles. I’m sure most people who buy low-performance sedans and family cars don’t care about these such things, and would prefer the lower gas/electric/fuel expanses. But it would be nice for them to keep a few sports cars ICE or hybrid to keep us fans happy. All in all, this is a lot more democratic than FORCING people to go BEV.
GM press release: We are going full ev by 2030 but if the market says no we will still have ice powertrains that we haven’t improved in 5-10 years give or take an intake.
global warming is a lie
an how are all these recharge stations at home and elsewhere going to affect the electric grid. you have backouts in high summer heat in large cities now add all the chargers to the air-conditioning and other devices,and the charge time, think we will be back to horses.
and of course hurricane season is coming too
I totally agree, climate change is real!
Just look, spring, summer, fall, winter.
Does it every year!
Nothing in life is inevitable.
Going all Electric is not without its own risk. Our electrical infrastructure is not going to be able to handle the loads they are talking about unless there are major major upgrades with our electrical grid system in the United States. also we are kicking the bucket down the road on pollution what with all the rare earth metals battery components are we going to do with them. These are just a few things we really need to think about
It won’t be long before ICE vehicles will be considered “contraptions” compared to EVs. Future generations will be amused and awestruck at the complexity of the ICE. Resist all you want, but it is in your future.
What many here fail to do is to do some research into this topic beyond their politics and their personal feelings.
What often gets missed is things outside the box of norms will be in play too. While most automakers may not spend much if anything on ICE moving forward others will.
Mahle is working on a Hybrid ICE 2-3 cylinder engine that they can sell to automakers as a package for vehicles that may need it in limited numbers in particular areas and applications. It will run on alternative fuels. and can even run a EV car with a generator or the wheels with a transmission.
No not everything will be 100% EV and there will be some ICE applications. But for the most EV will be the leading form of transportation sold post 2030-2050. Regulations alone will force this and to be honest by then there will be few penalties owning or driving a EV by that time.
The grid will be addressed and we will have enough Electic to deal with this. The metals parts will be taken care of with recycling and new technologies. Charging times will be conquered ranges will be as good or better than a tank of fuel. The cost of the cars will be cheaper than where ICE is going as ICE is going to be like Diesel and only get more expensive to build over time due to the regulations.
This is a topic you must look at all options and do your homework on. Personal opinions here no longer matter as they are beyond that now that the auto industry has embraced the EV tech now. The future customers mostly are just looking for a reliable vehicle, with utility and affordable and that is what these EV models will offer.
Even today styling and over all performance is no longer a major sticking point based on the cars we see on the road today.
There won’t even be any bans. ICE will continue to dominate throughout to 2050 by the time some other technology may spark off but it wont be battery powered. Even those solid state batteries have longevity issues and won’t last very long.
Battery electric vehicles are for the rich only, if you got disposable income otherwise ICE is still the preferable method. Long as GM and other companies will manufacture new ICE vehicles they will stay afloat. Battery electrics is just a fad that will eventually go away.