Italy is in talks with the European Union to create an exemption in proposed 2035 bans of internal combustion engines for the nation’s most iconic low-volume car manufacturers.
While recently speaking with Bloomberg, the current Minister for Ecological Transition in Prime Minister Draghi’s administration, Roberto Cingolani, who is also a former Ferrari board member, said the deal could allow small low-volume Italian carmakers to continue building gas-powered vehicles beyond 2035, a date being targeted by the EU to ban the sale of new ICE vehicles.
Read More: EU Makes Proposal To Ban New ICE Cars By 2035 Official
Bloomberg notes that smaller car manufacturers, such as Ferrari, Lamborghini, and Pagani will have a more difficult time switching to only building all-electric vehicles as they don’t benefit from the sale economies of scale that are allowing larger automakers to switch their portfolios to EVs.
In addition, the relative environmental impact of cars produced by key low-volume manufacturers in Italy is tiny compared to some of the world’s largest car manufacturers.
“Those cars need very special technology and they need batteries for the transition,” Cingolani said. “One important step is that Italy gets autonomous in producing high-performance batteries and that is why we are now launching the giga-factory program to install in Italy a very large scale production facility for batteries.”
While a regulation change could allow select companies to produce and sell ICE vehicles beyond 2035 across the European Union, both Ferrari and Lamborghini have announced electrification plans. In fact, Ferrari chairman and chief executive John Elkann recently said that the EU’s potential ICE ban would be a “welcome” change that the automaker supports. This statement came on the back of confirmation that Ferrari will launch its first EV in 2025.
