High energy prices, largely caused by the war in neighboring Ukraine, have been afflicting the whole of Europe for almost a year now and are already beginning to have an unpleasant effect on large industries. Volkswagen CEO Thomas Schäfer recently admitted this in a lengthy post on the professional social network LinkedIn.
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“Europe is not price-competitive in many areas. Especially when it comes to electricity and gas costs, we are increasingly losing touch. If we fail to effectively reduce energy prices in Germany and Europe, further investment in production or new battery factories will be virtually impossible,” he said, for example.
As an example of the path, Schäfer cited the deflationary law in the United States, which gives companies highly lucrative incentives to invest in new plant and production, unlike in Europe, where VW bosses say a fossilized bureaucratic system is being followed.
“The European Union urgently needs new tools to avoid the creeping arrival of deindustrialisation and to maintain the attractiveness of Europe as a place to create new technologies and jobs,” he added.
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At the same time, Volkswagen’s plans are very ambitious. By 2030, the company wants to operate six battery factories in Europe through its company PowerCo. Until 2025, VW will also invest 400 million euros in expanding the infrastructure of charging stations for electric cars across Europe. It also intends to produce 26 million pure electric vehicles by the end of the decade.
