Luxury car maker Bentley to stop making petrol vehicles and go fully electric by 2030
The model line-up of British luxury car maker Bentley Motors will include only plug-in hybrids and electric cars until 2026 and will be fully electric by 2030.
Chief executive Adrian Hallmark said the Volkswagen-owned company wants to “be ahead” of the UK’s move away from petrol engines.
Bentley said it will reinvent every aspect of its business to become an end-to-end carbon neutral organisation, starting with the launch of two plug-in hybrids next year as part of its “Beyond100” strategy to hasten the development of electric models.
Bentley’s first electric model will be available in 2025.
“The reason we are moving towards electrification is very simple; there are two factors ... one is customer demand – more and more [demand] is for electric vehicles ,” Mr Hallmark told BBC News on Friday.
“We have got customers ... asking when we can deliver the first electric Bentley.
“Secondly, of course, legislation is pushing combustion engines out of the market, so we don’t want to be a victim to that trend, we want to be ahead of it.”
As with several European countries, Britain has committed to phase out the sale of petrol and diesel-powered cars by 2040. However, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said earlier this year that he plans to bring forward an outright ban on the sale of traditionally powered passenger cars and hybrids to 2035.
If this happens, the UK would be the first nation to end the era of internal combustion, making the bid by Bentley – the world’s largest producer of 12-cylinder engines – to be fully electric by 2030 well ahead of
the curve.
In the summer, Bentley, which is 100 years old, said it would cut 1,000 jobs, about a quarter of its UK workforce, through a voluntary release and redundancy programme, as the Crewe-based company makes the shift towards an electric model line-up.
That figure was revised downwards to 800 last week, with the success of its voluntary redundancy programme reducing the risk of staff losing their jobs.
“It is not a question of shrinking the company, it is growing it but in a different way so [that] all the people engaged ... in the design, the assembly ... we [reposition] and retrain them,” Mr Hallmark said.
Bentley’s move to become a “sustainable” and “wholly ethical role model for luxury” comes as Volkswagen chief executive Herbert Diess also vowed to pursue a sweeping transition to electric cars this week.
Mr Diess said it was a matter of survival, despite the pandemic derailing the car industry in the short-term.
“If you are not fast enough, you are not going to survive,” Mr Diess said. “In the long run, climate change will be the biggest challenge mankind is facing.”
Volkswagen intends to double electric-vehicle sales in 2021, he said, as it seeks to meet increasingly stringent emissions regulations in Europe and elsewhere.
“Governments play a huge role by setting policy to influence consumer choices,” Mr Diess said.
“For many people, it will be very difficult to decide against an electric car.”
The company revealed its all-electric EXP 100 GT concept car last year, made with sustainable materials such as 5,000-year-old copper-infused Riverwood.
Last year, Bentley’s Crewe production plant was the first luxury car factory to be certified carbon neutral by the Carbon Trust, thanks to innovative solutions such as a water recycling system and a 10,000-solar panel car port.
The company said the result of its restructuring programme means it is in a position to achieve a positive financial performance for this year despite the slowdown caused by the pandemic.
Last week, Volkswagen announced it had returned to profit in the third quarter, thanks to growing demand for luxury cars.
Bentley will start with the launch of two plug-in hybrids next year while its first electric model will be available in 2025