Honda has stopped selling diesel cars in the UK market with the last remaining few are expected to be sold from dealers over the coming weeks. This means the only Honda cars and vehicles on sale will be petrol, hybrid or electric. This makes Honda the biggest name car maker to drop diesel car sales completely in the UK.
Honda had planned to move to zero-emission green technology vehicles by 2025, but the Japanese car manufacturer has brought this date forward to 2022 according to the Times. They plan to accelerate their goal for all European mainstream car models to be electrified by 2022.
The company has been steadily reducing its polluting vehicles over recent years and this is the next big step. Honda recently launched its Honda-e that became an instant hit with its efficiency and distinctive styling. It recently won the German Car of the Year Awards (GCOTY) New Energy class against some big players in the electric car space.
Honda is also expected to launch its next electric car soon. This will be a crossover that combines the styling of a saloon with a sports utility vehicle (SUV) and will use the same electric platform as the Honda-e. A concept version of Honda-e crossover was shown earlier in the year at the Beijing Motor Show.
It’s an exciting and positive time for electric cars. It will be interesting to see if other brands follow suit and try to move away from combustion engine cars sooner than planned, especially with sales of electric vehicles around the globe rocketing in recent months while their polluting counterparts have fallen dramatically.
A Honda spokesperson said: “Honda has accelerated its plans for all its European mainstream car models to be electrified from 2025 to 2022 and our motor petrol hybrid technology will play a key role in achieving this goal. As such, we plan for European production of diesel powertrains to cease by the end of 2022.”
