Volvo abandons internal combustion engine

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Via Reuters:

Geely-owned Volvo Car Group said on Wednesday all new models launched from 2019 will be fully electric or hybrids, spelling the eventual end to nearly a century of Volvos powered solely by the internal combustion engine.

The Gothenburg-based company will continue to produce pure combustion-engine Volvos from models launched before that date, but said it would introduce cars across its model line-up that ranged from fully electric cars to plug-in hybrids.

Volvo’s plans make it the first major traditional automaker to set a date for the complete phase-out of combustion-engine-only models though electrification has long been a buzzword across the industry and Elon Musk’s Tesla Motors has been a pure-play battery carmaker from day one.

“This announcement marks the end of the solely combustion engine-powered car,” Volvo Cars Chief Executive Hakan Samuelsson said in a statement.

Five new models set to be launched in 2019 through 2021 – three of them Volvos and two Polestar-branded – will all be fully or partially electric.

A Chinese Volvo with no internal combustion engine. What is the world coming to?

Now, bring on that Strayan coal-fired power station.

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About the author
David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal. He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.