Policy

A German importer will deliver the China-only Audi E5 Sportback from EUR 59,980 before VAT, roughly double its Chinese price. EU countervailing duties of 7.8% to 35.3% explain the gap: SAIC, Audi's Chinese partner, drew the top rate, while Tesla holds the lowest at 7.8% for its Shanghai-built cars.

Geely will manufacture higher-priced models from its own portfolio in Volvo's European plants from 2028, with Ghent, Torslanda and Košice all in play. Building inside the EU erases the 18.8% countervailing duty plus the 10% import duty that Geely-group cars pay today — against the 7.8% Tesla negotiated for the Shanghai-built Model 3.

An EU filing dated 5 August 2026 records Porsche leaving the Volkswagen Group's CO₂ pool to form an open pool with XPeng for 2026 and 2027. Porsche's own fleet averaged 118.6 g/km in 2025 against a VW Group target of 93.6 g/km, and its European EV sales are down about 30% year-on-year. The detail that matters for Tesla: a manufacturer that genuinely needs credits went to a Chinese brand with under 20,000 European registrations rather than to Tesla, whose regulatory-credit revenue fell 67% to $146 million in Q2 2026.

From 1 September a French taxi driver ordering an electric car can claim roughly €3,500, rising to about €5,500 where the car and its battery are both built in Europe. Orders must be placed by 31 December. For Tesla the money matters less than the gate: the scheme reuses France's environmental score, which the Berlin-built Model Y clears and the Shanghai-built Model 3 does not — and VTC drivers, who account for most of the Teslas working French streets, are excluded outright.

Germany's electric-car purchase premium means-tests the applicant's income but puts no ceiling on the price of the car. By 1 August that had subsidised more than 50 luxury EVs, including 36 Porsches, a Mercedes G 580 and a BMW i7. SPD and Green politicians want a price cap; the environment ministry refuses.

Carrefour Belgium has closed all 18 of its rooftop car parks to electric cars, citing the 250-500 kg they carry over a comparable petrol model and the difficulty of getting fire-fighting equipment onto a roof. Ground-level spaces stay open, and that is where the chargers already are.

An arrêté published in France's Journal officiel on 12 August creates a purchase grant for used electric cars, running from 1 September 2026 to 31 August 2030. Most private buyers get about €337 — not the €2,000-plus figure that travelled with the announcement, which applies only to home-care professionals. The car must be fully electric, first registered in France between 2017 and 2023, bought from a professional, kept for three years, and carry a battery certificate showing at least 80% of original capacity.

IF Metall is withdrawing all industrial action against Tesla from 19 August 2026, ending the longest strike in modern Swedish history after 1,021 days. Tesla never signed a collective agreement; the union says the company bought out its remaining members one by one until there was nobody left to strike.

The UK government and industry are each putting £65 million into electric and autonomous vehicle production through the Drive35 programme, naming Nissan and Bentley among recipients and £17 million for nine connected-autonomy projects. It safeguards 1,800+ jobs in a sector that built 764,715 vehicles in 2025, a 73-year low, and fell another 7.5% in the first half of 2026.

California's MyFirstEV gives first-time ZEV buyers an instant $3,500 off. Tesla's share of the $135 million state pot, matched dollar for dollar by the automakers, was exhausted five days after it opened to Tesla buyers on 3 August.

From 18 February 2027, EU rules require every EV battery above 2 kWh to carry a QR code opening a digital battery passport with chemistry, raw-material origin, carbon footprint, recycled content and state of health. Article 14 also forces manufacturers to open battery management system data to independent repairers — which is what makes used-EV battery condition verifiable for the first time.

Germany's new EV purchase premium is driving the registration surge that pushed BEV share to 29.3% in July — and EY's Constantin Gall calls the result "Scheinwachstum", pseudo-growth. With the market still 19.4% below its 2019 level and the €3 billion programme funded only to 2029, EY expects registrations to fall once the subsidy expires.

At least five Spanish regions say they cannot pay every pending Moves III 2025 application even after a €400 million top-up. Madrid alone is €24.73 million short on the car line, and buyers who purchased on the promise of a grant are still waiting.

Italy opened its 2026 Ecobonus for light commercial vehicles at midday on 29 July. The €16 million ring-fenced for electric vans was fully booked in about 20 minutes, and all €40 million in roughly 50 minutes.

A European Commission study puts 64 million vehicles at risk of losing eCall as operators retire 2G and 3G. Cars built from roughly 2010 to the early 2020s carry modems that cannot fall back to 4G, and for many of them there is no retrofit worth paying for.

Porsche SE, which controls Volkswagen, posted a €2.2 billion net loss for the first half of 2026 after writing down its VW stake by around €3 billion. Chairman Hans Dieter Pötsch called for swift action on costs and capacity at Europe's largest carmaker.

A memorandum signed on 30 July 2026 commits South Korea to making every new police vehicle purchase battery-electric or hydrogen by 2035. Only 12.4% of the country's 17,600-strong police fleet is zero-emission today, and the agency buys about 1,900 vehicles a year.

Reklamombudsmannen ruled on 5 August 2026 that a BYD film showing a skier being towed at speed behind a Sealion 7 breached the ICC marketing code. BYD argued the shoot was controlled and carried a disclaimer; the panel said the stunt could not be justified.

Speaking at the Red Rock Casino in Las Vegas on 5 August 2026, President Trump mocked range anxiety, saying electric-car drivers "have a disease" and calling them "crazy". The remarks landed against a policy record of scrapping the federal EV tax credit and cutting charging funds.

From 1 May 2027 Belgium introduces a digital, licence-plate-linked road vignette for all vehicles up to 3.5 tonnes, covering motorways and regional roads across Flanders, Wallonia and Brussels. Battery-electric cars pay €90 a year against €100 for most petrol and diesel cars and €125 for the oldest. Short-term vignettes start at €9 a day.

Emails obtained by Reuters through a public-records request show Tesla has pushed the Dutch RDW to withhold the documentation behind its FSD safety assessment since late 2024. The RDW approved FSD (Supervised) in April 2026 and cites Tesla's commercial secrets as the reason it will not say why.

Porsche AG chief executive Michael Leiters told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung that Porsche cannot survive alone in its current form and depends on Volkswagen Group scale. The same interview confirmed the electric 718 is going ahead, the Taycan stays with fewer variants, and close to 9,000 jobs will go over ten years.

Germany's new electric-car purchase premium had drawn 103,500 applications by 5 August, roughly double the mid-June figure. More than 90% are for battery-electric cars, but only about 28,000 have been fully approved so far.

The Danube fell to about 10 cm at Budapest on 3 August 2026, below the 2018 record low of 33 cm. Nuclear plants in Hungary and Romania lost most of their cooling water, Romania declared a nationwide energy state of alert, and Dacia and Ford stopped their Romanian plants until 19 August to free up around 200 MW.