Euro 7 environmental regulations in their current form could lead to the layoff of 10,000 Skoda workers and the disappearance of the most affordable models from the European market — Fabia, Scala and Kamiq.
The discussion around Euro 7 environmental standards continues to escalate: the head of Stellantis corporation Carlos Tavares and the CEO of Renault Group Luca de Meo have already strongly opposed them, and Martin Jahn, board member and head of marketing and sales at Skoda Auto, added fuel to the fire over the weekend. part of the Volkswagen Group. In the framework of the Sunday TV debate, Martin Jahn said that if the Euro 7 environmental standards in their current edition are adopted, Skoda will be forced to abandon the most affordable models — Fabia, Scala and Kamiq, since their adaptation to Euro 7 will not be economically viable (in other words, these models will no longer be available).
Fabia, Scala and Kamiq made up about a third of Skoda Auto's production in 2022 (the company produced a total of 764,837 cars), their loss from the European model line threatens to lay off at least 3,000 people, and in general, the introduction of Euro 7 standards could lead to a reduction in Skoda's staff Auto for more than 10,000 people, as one of the company's European plants will simply have to close.
Fabia, Scala and Kamiq are produced at the main Skoda plant in Mladá Boleslav (Czech Republic), but it is unlikely that the company will close this particular site, since the Octavia, Karoq models and the Enyaq iV electric crossover are also produced here, and in general Mladá Boleslav is a historical place for Skoda, the closure of the plant here would be a very painful step from the image point of view. It is more likely that the plant in Bratislava (Slovakia) or in Kvasiny (Czech Republic) will fall under the knife.
The European Commission has been actively working on Euro 7 environmental regulations since the beginning of 2021, for cars and light commercial vehicles they should come into force in July 2025, for trucks and buses — in July 2027. The first edition of Euro 7 shocked automakers, then the draft document was amended, the latest edition was presented in November 2022, the final decision is planned to be made by 2024.
For vehicles with internal combustion engines, the current version of Euro 7 requires that the declared environmental performance be maintained for 10 years or 200,000 km of run, and the testing requirements are significantly tightened: the temperature spread (from -10 to +45 ° C), speed, altitude difference and much more other. The adaptation of internal combustion engines to Euro 7 will require huge investments from car manufacturers, which will lead to a critical increase in prices for cars in the lower segments of the car market. In addition, investments in adapting internal combustion engines to Euro 7 simply will not have time to pay off, as in 2035 Europe wants to introduce a ban on sales of new passenger cars and light commercial vehicles with internal combustion engines running on fossil fuels.
With the ICE ban so far, too, things are not going very smoothly: in February, the European Parliament adopted a law on this ban by a majority of votes, but Germany, Italy, Poland and the Czech Republic threatened to block it if the law is not amended, in particular, the exclusion of the ban for internal combustion engines powered by synthetic fuel. Volkswagen, through Porsche, is now investing heavily in the development of synthetic climate-neutral fuels (eFuels) so that they can continue to produce ICE cars for as long as they like.