Italy seeks to shield supercars from combustion engine ban

Rome

ITALY is in talks with the European Union on ways to shield supercar makers, including Ferrari and Lamborghini, from the planned phase-out of combustion engine vehicles by 2035, according to a minister in Prime Minister Mario Draghi's administration.

While the Italian government fully backs Europe's commitment to cut emissions by phasing out the most-polluting engines, "in the gigantic cars market... there are ongoing discussions with the EU Commission" on how the new rules would apply to high-end carmakers that sell a much lower number of vehicles than mainstream producers, Roberto Cingolani, minister for ecological transition, said in an interview. "Those cars need very special technology and they need batteries for the transition," he said, adding that Italy will produce high-performance batteries and launch a giga-factory programme to start a very large scale production facility for batteries.

The European Commission in July announced plans to phase out sales of new combustion-engine cars by 2035 as part of efforts to cut emissions that contribute to global warming. That timeline is particularly challenging for luxury carmakers that produce vehicles with powerful engines that emit above-average levels of pollution. They have much lower sales that limit the economies of scale that can be gained from converting production plants. BLOOMBERG