The vast majority of vehicle buyers today isn’t interested in or ready for an electric vehicle. Ford and other major automakers know this, but they think demand will increase over the next handful of years. Ford is one of the big backers of the fuel economy and emissions plan with California that has resulted in a war between California and Washington.
The LA Times reckons that the Mustang Mach-E is part of how Ford plans to back up its commitment on electric vehicles. To meet the regulations that Ford agreed on with California, the automaker needs to bring its fleetwide average fuel economy goals to 50 mpg by 2026. This is going to be a big challenge for Ford since it ditched almost all cars, which were its fuel economy leaders, in the States in favor of trucks, SUVs and the Mustang.
Ford has made it clear that all of its vehicles will get an electrified version. However, the Mustang Mach-E is a big part of the plan to meet those fuel economy goals. Ford will also get help on the fleetwide fuel economy next year when the hybrid Ford F-150 lands and when the fully electric F-150 comes later. A legal battle over Ford’s deal with California is coming.
The Trump administration wants to kill the deal California made and have automakers follow the federal regulations that aimed at freezing mpg targets after 2020 at 37 mpg. The federal government has since changed its stance somewhat with an announcement in October that there will be small yearly increases in fuel economy targets each year. Still, they are much lower than what Obama-era regulations would impose. The Mach-E will land late next year in several versions with different levels of performance and driving range. Top-end models will go 300 miles per charge.
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Source: LA Times
Comments
By the time these two model lines get mass produced for CA market, I’d think they’d sell really well; all the big-city buyers will already have the EV infrastructure in place, range anxiety won’t be as big issue as it is now.
Ford, however, won’t sell a single Mach-E or F-150e to farmers, ranchers and regular folk who choose to live as far away from the city as they can afford, due to these factors off the cuff; 1) No EV infrastructure in place nor, are there any plans to put them there – because no one there is buying EV and 2) there is barely adequate home charging units available and none are affordable (because they aren’t buying because of where they live).
Should (at least) L2 or higher capacity chargers be made and affordable for the home, and L3 chargers be installed at rural Wal Marts, Dollar General and Dollar Tree stores, that should help sales, significantly. California will lead the U.S. in xEV useage.
California might be the only place on Earth with enough morons to pay $45k-$70k for this POS.