Over the last few years, Ford made an aggressive push to get more EVs on the road—as did many automakers. But as we’ve seen elsewhere, companies are starting to roll back EV plans as customer demand wanes. Ford is the latest to admit it might have been too aggressive in its EV push.
In an interview with Autocar, COO of Ford’s Model E electrification division, Marin Gjaja, said that the company was overly ambitious with its EV plans in Europe. “I think customers have voted, and they told us that was too ambitious,” Gjaja noted. “We don’t see that going all-electric by 2030 [in Europe] is a good choice for our business or, especially, for our customers.”
Ford announced in 2021 that it had plans to make its entire European fleet electric by 2030, but this is the second report that recently surfaced suggesting Ford will slow those plans. In May, Ford of Europe’s General Manager Martin Sander told Automotive News that gas engines could continue on past 2030. “If we see strong demand, for instance for plug-in hybrid vehicles, we will offer them.”
In this case, Gjaja cites slowing EV adoption and rising costs as the main reasons for the recent rollback. Currently, Ford only sells two EVs in Europe: The Explorer EV and the Mustang Mach-E. The new Ford Capri will go on sale later this year.
Ford hasn’t made any statements regarding its EV plans in the US. But the company did recently announce that it will expand production of its Super Duty trucks in Canada—which will include a hybrid option—and we know that more hybrids and plug-ins hybrids aren’t off the table.