Martin Sander: Ford plans to continue production in Valencia for ‘many years’ | Economy

Although the ERTE will remain in effect until the end of this month, Ford says it will have a plant in Almussafes in the long term. “Valencia is an excellent plant, we produce the Kuga and plan to do so for many years (…) it is very high on our agenda,” said Martin Sander, director of Ford’s electric vehicle division, this Wednesday in Brussels, who at the same time demanded “ obligations…

Although the ERTE will remain in effect until the end of this month, Ford says it will have a plant in Almussafes in the long term. “Valencia is an excellent plant, we produce the Kuga and plan to do so for many years (…) it is very high on our agenda,” said Martin Sander, director of Ford’s electric vehicle division, this Wednesday in Brussels, who At the same time he demanded from European governments with a “strong commitment” to promoting electric vehicles in the next decade – a task that, he warns, southern countries will have to accelerate even more.

Workers at the Valencia plant are waiting to learn about plans from Ford, which in February assured it was “working on an alternative to address” the shortage of models at the Valencia plant, “given the uncertainty created by electrical current.” car today.”

There are some doubts that have not yet been resolved and this is what is slowing down the decision on Almussafes, admitted Sander, who, however, assures that this plant has a future. “A little over a year ago we did a study and decided that Valencia would be our top priority for introducing another electrified Ford platform in Europe,” he recalls when asked by this newspaper. “We haven’t made a final decision yet, but we are working on several proposals and I think we will make a decision in the not too distant future,” he added.

In this decision, he clarified, various variables will have to come into play, which depend not solely on the Valencia plant, but, as Ford says, on the situation with the “slowdown” of electric vehicles across Europe, which has led to car companies “as a whole reconsider your plans. “When is the right time to move to another electric platform? And what volume are we aiming for? What price can we aim for for the product we plan to supply to Europe?” Sander listed variables that continue to be studied regarding Almussafes.

“That’s why we’re not in a hurry,” the German explained, recalling that Ford has a “solid” model offering for the next few years. “But of course the time will come to decide on the next generation of products, and of course then Valencia will be on the agenda,” he insisted.

According to the Ford manager, the future, without a doubt, belongs to the electric car. “We are committed to electric mobility in Europe, especially because there is no real alternative to electric mobility, it is the best technology” that will be able to respond to the needs of drivers and respect the environment in the near future, he assured.

But so that 2035, the agreed date to end the use of internal combustion engines, can also be the time when electric cars become the majority in Europe, serious “commitment” is needed from European and national authorities to ensure that electric cars become the majority in Europe in the first place. The network will be ready and there will be enough charging points to make these cars a better alternative for consumers in just ten years. Something in which, especially southern Europe, is lagging far behind, he warns: “Across Europe the speed” of introducing charging points needs to be accelerated quite significantly, but in the south “a little more radically” because if countries like Norway or Sweden, according to Sander, they are already around 30%, penetration in Spain or Italy barely reaches 5%.

The main “challenge” on the road to full adoption of electric vehicles in 2035 “is not cars, we will have a wide range of electric vehicles, and they will be affordable. And this is not necessarily the source of energy (…) the big problem is the network, the laying of cables and everything necessary for electric vehicles to receive energy (…) and the speed of introduction of new chargers. no glasses. In general, things are good in Europe,” he emphasized.

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