Jack Hollis, chief operating officer of Toyota Motor North America, recently publicly criticized the US government’s policies to promote the popularization of electric vehicles (EVs), saying that these policies are actually “mandatory requirements” and pointed out that they have failed to keep pace with consumer demand and market reality.
In an interview with the media, Hollis said that although electric vehicles have obvious advantages in environmental protection and energy efficiency, the US government’s policy efforts to promote the rapid popularization of electric vehicles are too strong, which may have a negative impact on the healthy development of the automobile market. Hollis specifically mentioned that the current policy setting focuses too much on electric vehicle sales targets and ignores consumers’ diverse choices for different types, price ranges and usage needs.
Hollis believes that the US government has actually transformed this transformation into a “mandatory requirement” rather than a spontaneous market choice by formulating strict electric vehicle sales regulations and requiring traditional automakers to significantly increase the proportion of electric vehicle sales within a certain period of time. As one of the world’s largest automakers, Toyota has made significant achievements in the field of hybrid models (such as Prius) in recent years, but has been relatively cautious in the launch of pure electric vehicles. Hollis said the company prefers to proceed step by step and keep in line with consumer demand.
“Electric vehicles are the future, but we need to make sure consumers can afford them and are willing to buy them,” Hollis said. “Current policies require us to significantly increase the production and sales of electric vehicles in a very short period of time, but consumer demand is far from this level, and many consumers still have reservations about the price, charging facilities and range of electric vehicles.”