Editor’s note: Every new electric vehicle means the nation in which it runs will need to import a little less crude oil or gasoline, and that country becomes a bit more self-sufficient in energy. Ideally, these EVs will be recharged by wind or solar-generated power. In other related news on this day, wind advocates are touring a GM assembly plant in Texas that is powered completely by wind power. After all, it is Texas.
Mark Fields / CEO / Ford
As the company kicks off 2017, we’re also looking further into the future. The era of more affordable electrified vehicles is dawning, and we have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make people’s lives better by changing the way the world moves.
This vehicle is a plug in hybrid.
That’s why we’re confirming seven of 13 new global EVs coming from Ford in the next five years (by 2022) as part of a $4.5 billion investment. They include our most popular trucks, commercial vehicles, and performance vehicles. At the same time, we’re also creating new services and mobility solutions that will make it easy to use EVs.
In the next 15 years, we see global EV industry offerings outnumbering gasoline-powered vehicles, as people around the world continue moving to cities, consumer preferences shift to greener transportation and battery prices fall — all making tomorrow’s EVs less expensive to own than today’s gas-powered vehicles.
These new Ford electrified vehicles will include full hybrids that never need plugging in, plug-in hybrids that can run on electricity alone or gasoline when the battery is almost empty, and full electric vehicles that make zero emissions by using only batteries and electric motors to move.
This kind of EV leadership is two decades in the making, starting with the introduction of the Escape Hybrid in 2004 — the first mass-produced hybrid built in the U.S. and the first SUV hybrid. Some are still being used as taxis today, moving passengers for more than 350,000 miles with their original batteries.
Last year, our C-MAX and Fusion Energi hybrids made Ford the best-selling brand of plug-in hybrid vehicles in America. Plus, we’ve sold more than 560,000 EVs globally since 2005.
More importantly, leading in electrification, autonomy, and connectivity are critical to the company’s expansion to an auto and a mobility company.
Read the rest of Fields’ comments here: https://goo.gl/GR8c7y
Filed Under: News, Policy
