Seven States Defend 2035 Engine Ban

The fight over the EU's 2035 car rule is less about climate purity than industrial survival. France, Spain and five smaller countries want to keep the deadline that underpins billions in battery investment. Germany, Italy and several eastern European governments want more room for combustion engines, each with its own economic reason.

For Malta, which does not build cars but lives with whatever Europe's car market produces, this is not a distant Brussels argument. The rule will shape what importers can sell, what households can afford, and what eventually appears in the second-hand market.

The EU's Regulation 2023/851 does not formally ban combustion engines. It sets CO2 emissions for new cars at zero grams per kilometre from 2035, which in practice leaves battery-electric vehicles as the only mass-market option. In December 2025, the European Commission proposed softening this to 90%, allowing carmakers to cover the remaining 10% with e-fuels, synthetic fuels made from captured CO2, or biofuels.

On June 5, seven countries signed a joint declaration defending the original target, at the initiative of France's ecological transition minister. They say they have a blocking minority in the EU Council, meaning the 35% of the EU population needed to stop a law. The arithmetic just about works. One country peeling away would bring it down.

France defends the deadline to protect industrial bets, not climate principles

France has too much money tied up in batteries to let the rule slip. The government put €700 million in subsidies and €880 million in public loans into Verkor's Dunkirk battery factory alone. That wager only makes sense if the 2035 deadline forces carmakers to buy European batteries rather than cheaper Asian ones.

The problem is that Renault, Verkor's anchor customer, cut its orders from 12 GWh a year to just 3 GWh. The batteries cost 30-40% more than Korean and Chinese alternatives. Macron's earlier target of 100-120 GWh of French capacity by 2030 is now described as "out of reach".

France is not defending the deadline because the strategy is working. It is defending it because the regulation is now the main support left under that strategy.

Germany's industry does not agree with its chancellor

Chancellor Merz wants the rule scrapped. The VDA, Germany's auto industry association, warns that 225,000 jobs are at risk by 2035. But Germany's car industry is not speaking with one voice.

A May 2026 Fraunhofer ISI study found that more than 60% of German auto companies have already invested heavily in electrification and see weaker CO2 standards as "the least desired measure." These firms want legal certainty because they have already spent the money. The pressure to loosen the rules comes mainly from companies that moved later and now want the timetable stretched.

Italy: one company's biofuel bet, dressed as national strategy

Italy is selling a "third way": let cars running on biofuels count as zero-emission. The clearest winner would be Eni. The energy group held 13 meetings with the Commission in 18 months and received €1 billion from the European Investment Bank to convert two refineries.

Massimiliano Salini, the Parliament's rapporteur on the revision and a Forza Italia/EPP MEP, proposed raising biofuel credits from 3% to 10%. Environmental groups say the position tracks industry lobbying.

For consumers, the numbers are less persuasive. Driving 100 km on HVO, hydrogenated vegetable oil and the most advanced biofuel, costs about €11.30 in Italy. That is roughly 52% more than charging an EV at €7.40.

The divide runs east-west

The affordability gap explains much of the politics. The cheapest new EV in Europe, a Dacia Spring at about €16,900, costs around seven months of median net salary in Germany. In Hungary, it is close to two years.

France can cushion that shift. Its "social leasing" programme offers EVs at €100-200 a month to low-income households and has reached 100,000 families over two years. No eastern EU country has an equivalent scheme.

The adoption figures show the same split. Denmark, where EVs make up roughly 80% of new car sales, loses little from a hard deadline. Hungary is in a different position. Its battery factories lost 136 billion forints in 2025, and the government is now blocking further Chinese factory expansion. For Budapest, delay is not ideological. It buys time.

What remains open

Neither Parliament nor Council has voted. Trilogue negotiations, the three-way talks between Commission, Parliament and Council that settle the final text of EU law, are not expected before late 2026.

The seven-country blocking minority is real on paper, but weak in practice. Europe is arguing over the pace of a transition while its battery factories lose money, workers face retraining without tested models, and the cheapest EVs still come from China.