Jaguar Land Rover to exclusively make electric or hybrid cars from 2020

Jaguar Land Rover has become the latest carmaker to say it will stop building cars solely powered by internal combustion engines, two months after Volvo pledged to do so. The UK-based manufacturer promised that all new models from 2020 will be fully electric or hybrid, a year later than Volvo’s target, but a big step beyond its unveiling last November of a single electric concept car.

Prof David Bailey, an automotive expert at Aston University, said the company had been slow to wake up to electric vehicles.

“Jaguar is playing catch-up – Tesla has stolen a chunk of their lunch, BMW are way ahead as well,” he said.

“The premium end of things is moving more quickly [towards electrification] in part because electric car costs are higher at the moment because of battery costs, so they can absorb that. It’s also because they are heavily dependent on diesel and the market is moving away from diesel.” Jaguar Land Rover says it’s giving consumers more choice by electrifying all of its future products, and that’s probably fair. More buyers can be convinced that a Range Rover with some batteries in it may be all they need for stop-and-go Manhattan traffic.