EU Needs More Electric Cars & Hybrids To Meet Carbon Goals

A new study by Ricardo-AEA has found that the European Union (EU) needs to get a lot more pure electric and hybrid electric cars into the hands of consumers in order to meet its 2025 carbon reduction goals (presumably, getting more people to bike or take mass transit would work just as well).

“The consultancy, which advises governments and companies, looked at a set of scenarios for 2025 in the study, commissioned by campaign groups Greenpeace and Transport & Environment and seen by Reuters prior to official publication,” Reuters writes.

“It found that an average of 70 g/km across the bloc could be achieved by 2025 if new car sales were divided roughly equally between hybrid and conventional cars. The resulting extra manufacturing costs of around 1,615 euros ($2,200) for a hybrid car could be paid back in less than three years through fuel savings.

“The same goal could be reached if new car sales included 7 percent electric vehicles and then only 22 percent hybrid cars, the study found.”

This is part of an experimental “Sunday quickies” series in which we quickly cover stories recent stories for which we didn’t have time during the previous week.